


Gaymers

by haelpack



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Background Pinkberry, Best Friend!Christine, M/M, YouTube, youtube au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-01 00:29:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 20,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13283106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haelpack/pseuds/haelpack
Summary: Michael Mell has over seven million subscribers across his two Youtube channels, while Jeremy can hardly get a thousand followers on his blog. Nevertheless, the two have tons in common. They're the same age, they live in New York City, they have all the same interests. Of course Jeremy was going to fall in love. What could possibly go wrong?Oh, yeah. Michael doesn't even know Jeremy exists.





	1. Like, Comment, & Subscribe!

**Author's Note:**

> The title comes from Annabeth Albert's new adult book series, #gaymers!

**NOTIFICATION FROM YOUTUBE**  
New video from gaymers: Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time #4 (Watch till the end!!)

 **NOTIFICATION FROM YOUTUBE**  
New video from gaymersvlog: I lost all my footage!! (NOT clickbait!)

 **NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: check out my two new videos, comment to be next week’s shoutout!

 **NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: we’re still meeting at the theater at 5 rite????

 **NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
3 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

—

Jeremy was fighting every urge in his body not to pick up his phone as it continued to buzz, one notification after another popping up. His phone was sitting on the table, right next to his notebook. He was trying to be a good student and actually pay attention for the last ten minutes of class, but it was hard. He almost shoved his phone in his pocket, but realized that the vibrating phone would be _much_ more distracting on his leg than on the table. So it sat there, lighting up every couple minutes. Taunting him.

Okay! He could text Christine back, right? If he didn’t, she would just send more and more texts until he responded, and would thus become a much bigger distraction if he didn’t. He waited for the lecturer, some graduate student named Todd, to turn his back and he opened the text message just as a second one from Christine came in.

 **Christine** : jer i need to know like now

 **Me** : u can wait until i’m out of class ya know

 **Me** : but yeah, 5. 

**Christine** : oops i forgot u were in class sorry

“Do I have to remind everyone that phones are not allowed in my class?” Todd’s voice broke and Jeremy sighed. He looked up to see the graduate student towering over him, glaring. He gave a sheepish smile.

“It was an emergency?” He tried, but Todd didn’t seem to buy it. 

“Then you can step out of the room to handle next time.” Jeremy dropped the phone back onto the table and Todd stormed back to the front of the small classroom. God, Jeremy hated GAs. They thought they were _so_ big and important just because they stood at the front of the class and read off a PowerPoint. Anyone could do that.

It was time to go by then anyway, so Jeremy just rolled his eyes and packed up his stuff. He was out the door first, thanks to his long legs and strategic choice in seat. He was lucky that participation wasn’t a grade in that class, because he for sure would have lost points if it were. 

The first thing Jeremy did was call his best friend, Christine. The two had gone to the same high school, meeting in the drama club. People liked to say that Jeremy just followed her to NYU for college, but that wasn’t quite true. Yes, maybe he’d considered NYU more strongly once Christine had named it her number one choice for college, but it had already been on his list! No one but Christine seemed to believe him on that, though.

“I’m sorry,” Christine said by way of answering her phone. Jeremy dodged a group of people outside the elevator and headed to the stairway. It was only the second floor, anyway.

“It’s fine,” Jeremy said, “Todd’s an ass anyway, so who cares? It’s not like I’ll ever use the stuff in that class anyway.”

“What class was it?” She asked, still sounding worried. “Comm, right?”

“Psych.” 

“Ah, sorry.”

“It’s really no big deal. Class was almost over anyway. Why were you so impatient, anyway? You barely gave me a minute to respond.” Jeremy took the stairs two at a time, passing others on his way down to the first floor. It was four o’clock, so he didn’t have much time to get back to his dorm and get ready to meet Christine at the campus theater. Christine was auditioning for the musical and she insisted Jeremy come as moral support. They were meeting early so Christine could practice once more for Jeremy before the auditions started.

“Chloe and Brooke are having a liveshow in, like, five minutes,” Christine said sheepishly. “I wanted to see how much of it I could watch.”

Ah, yes, Chloe and Brooke. Pinkberry, as their joint Youtube channel was called. They were some lifestyle/makeup guru Youtubers that Christine was half in love with. Jeremy would have made fun of her for it, but he knew he wasn’t one to talk. 

“Do you want me to bring my laptop so you can watch it between auditions?” Jeremy offered. It was nippy outside and he pulled his cardigan closer. It was October and just starting to get cold enough that he was going to have to start wearing a real jacket.

“Could you?” He crossed the street, to his dorm building. He was lucky to have a dorm so close to his classes; it would make winter much easier.

“That’s why I offered.” Jeremy fished in his backpack for his school ID to get into his dorm building, but it was difficult to do with one hand.

“Oh! It’s starting, I’ll see you in an hour.” Christine hung up before he could say bye. Jeremy shook his head at her antics and finally grabbed his ID. He swiped it and the door unlocked, allowing him into the building.

He had a single dorm room, thanks to a mishap with his freshman year roommate (he’d had to switch rooms three months in and he did _not_ like to talk about it). It was actually quite nice, not having to deal with anyone else in his space. Plus, it meant that Christine could hang out there and hide from her own roommate whenever she wanted. Win/win.

He opted out of taking a shower before meeting up with Christine, deciding he didn’t have enough time and didn’t want to brave the community bathrooms right then. So, instead, he opened his laptop and pulled up Youtube. He’d seen in Psych class that his favorite Youtuber, gaymers, had posted two videos and with any luck, he’d be able to watch them both before meeting Christine.

Gaymers was the gaming channel of a guy named Michael Mell, who was nineteen-years-old, just like Jeremy, but already infinitely more successful. He had seven million subscribers across his two channels (five million on his gaming channel and two million on his vlog channel). He was awesome at video games, had such an interesting life, and was pretty much great in every way.

Yeah, Jeremy had a huge crush on the guy. Too bad he would never know that Jeremy existed. 

Jeremy, on the other hand, had a small blog that he posted on far more than he needed to. It was technically gaming centered, but he really posted whatever he wanted (it just happened to be that most of what he wanted to post was about video games). It hovered around 950 followers, which wasn’t terrible until you realized that he’d had the blog for going on three years. Still, he loved his blog and updated it almost every single day. 

Jeremy clicked on Michael’s newest video from his main channel, the fourth in his Ocarina of Time series. Ocarina of Time was Jeremy’s favorite Legend of Zelda game, so he’d been especially loving this series. Plus, Michael was doing a new setup with a dual screen, so you could watch the game and see his face as he played, so that was a bonus. Michael had a cute face, not that Jeremy would ever admit that to anyone but Christine. Christine was the only one who wouldn’t mock him for crushing on an internet celebrity.

Jeremy settled back and watched the video, getting more distracted by Michael’s reactions as the video went on. Michael was the exact kind of person who should have a gaming channel; he was so animated as he played and it was incredibly entertaining to watch. Jeremy barely even looked at the half of the screen with the actual game on it.

“Gah!” Michael yelled on the screen, eyes widening as he failed yet again to get past the guard. He ran his hand through his dark hair and pushed his glasses up his nose. “God, this part is impossible. How the hell is it that I got past is super easy as a kid, but now I just can’t?”

He restarted that part again, eyes squinting in concentration. The video was almost silent, just the soft music of the game as Michael tried to get past the guard. His tongue poked out between his lips, a quirk that many of his subscribers poked fun at him for.

When he finally got past the guard and onto the next part of the game, Michael cheered. He threw the controller up into the air and caught it, whooping. Jeremy even let out a little cheer of his own, which was kind of embarrassing. This was one of those moments where he was glad he didn’t have a roommate, as they would have no doubt made fun of him for something like that. Even Christine would have teased him for getting so into watching a game instead of playing it himself.

“Hey, you guys wanna see something cool that I just learned about Ocarina?” Michael asked rhetorically. He held up his controller so the camera could see it and punched in a series of numbers so fast that Jeremy could keep up. The game glitched, skipping straight through the next part of the game until Link met Zelda. “Pretty cool, huh? You can skip to the next cut scene or boss battle just about any time you want. Only problem is that you don’t get any items leading up to it, so you could really screw yourself over. But it’s cool if you’re really struggling to get past a skirmish or something. I’ll put the sequence in the description so you guys can try it for yourselves.”

Jeremy had never heard of that sort of cheat before, but he thought it was pretty cool. He made a mental note to try it out and write a blog post about it sometime that week.

“Anyway,” Michael went on, turning off the game, “that’s all for today! This is this week’s shoutout, so go and check them out. I hope you enjoyed this video, and don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe if you haven’t yet. See ya next time, nerds.” It went to the end card, the Legend of Zelda theme playing softly in the background.

‘See ya next time, nerds’ was sort of Michael’s little outtro catchphrase. And (embarrassingly enough), it was the description on Jeremy’s blog. He’d put it as the last line of a blog post once, but had felt awkward at stealing Michael’s phrase. Not that he’d ever see it or know, but still. He’d just stuck it at his blog’s description and let it be.

Jeremy glanced at the clock and sighed. He didn’t have enough time to watch Michael’s new vlog before he had to leave. He wouldn't be able to watch it until late that night, now, since he wouldn’t be able to watch it at the auditions. Christine would kill him.

—

“You’re ready,” Jeremy told Christine as she sang her audition song for the fourth time. They’d taken breaks to watch the Pinkberry lifestream in an attempt to keep Christine’s nerves down, but it clearly wasn’t working. She looked like she was about to cry.

“Are you sure?” Christine asked, looking nervous. She twisted the hem of her shirt around a finger loosely. “Did I hit that high note? I couldn’t tell, which probably means I didn’t and if I don’t do it perfectly they’re not going to cast me as Natalie and-”

“Chris!” Jeremy grabbed her hand and pulled so she was sitting next to him. He squeezed her hand tight. “You were great. You’ll be great in there, I know it. No one would be a better Natalie than you.”

Christine tucked her hair behind her ears. “You don’t know that, Jeremy. There are plenty of talented people at this school.” 

“I do know it,” Jeremy said honestly. “Hey, I bet you twenty bucks you’ll get the part.”

Christine shot him a look. “I’m not betting against myself!”

“Ah, ‘cause you know you’ll get the part and lose the bet,” Jeremy said, poking her in the side. She giggled, swatting his hand away.

“Maybe.”

“Okay everyone, the next group is Anna Banks, Christine Canigula, Jeffery Davidson, and Mitchel Green.” The assistant director announced, reading off of her clipboard. Christine grabbed Jeremy’s arm, digging her fingernails into his wrist as she gave him a terrified look.

“You got this,” he said again.

“I wish you were auditioning, too,” she whispered. People were getting up, heading into the theater for their audition. Jeremy gave a half-smile.

“If only I wasn’t tone deaf,” he said ruefully. “I’d be the king of musicals!”

Christine gave a small laugh. She let go of his arm and stood on shaky legs. She didn’t move. Jeremy resisted from rolling his eyes (they both knew she was amazing, so why was she so nervous?) and sat forward. He gave her a good shove on the back and she stumbled forward before regaining her balance and heading into the theater. She gave him one last look and he shot her a thumbs up.

He loved Christine like a sister, but she could really be a handful sometimes.

He had some time to kill, having seen that there was at least half an hour between audition groups. Jeremy grabbed his laptop, where the Pinkberry liveshow was still playing on mute. Chloe and Brooke were cute, Jeremy had to admit that. They were funny, too. Jeremy could see why Christine liked to watch their videos. They had joint channel, each girl posting one solo video a week and they did one joint video a week. Christine always said she liked their joint videos best. She was convinced the girls were dating, but hadn’t said anything publicly about it yet. Christine was, ahem, _very_ passionate about that. Jeremy knew better than to argue with her.

Jeremy checked his blog idly, just killing time. He responded to his new comments, all from long-time followers whose names he recognized. He thought about making a new post, but didn’t really know what to talk about. He needed to try out the Zelda cheat for himself before writing about it, so he couldn't do that.

He sighed, already bored without Christine right there. His headphone jack on his laptop was broken, so he couldn’t watch any Youtube videos to pass the time. Luckily, his phone buzzed just then, giving him something to do.

 **NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: so there seems to be some intense differences of opinion about the latest legend of zelda video…

Jeremy raised his eyebrows, swiping to open the tweet fully.

 **@gaymersmichael** : so there seems to be some intense differences of opinion about the latest legend of zelda video, all i can say is that i wanted to share something interesting about the game with you guys

Jeremy dug around in the replies, trying to figure out what Michael was talking about when he got another notification. He opened the new tweet.

 **@gaymersmichael** : i’ve shared game hacks and cheats before, so i’m not too sure why you guys are mad about this one

 **@gaymersmichael** : but i’m going to take the video down and re-edit it without the cheat. hopefully this will clear up any upset about it! the video will be back up in a few hours x

Jeremy shook his head. He chewed on his lip, annoyed that people were being mean to Michael. It may have been odd, but Jeremy felt very… attached to Michael. It was more than the crush (though not to say that the crush wasn’t a large part of it, because it was), but they were the same age, both lived in New York, had very similar interests. Whenever any sort of drama came up, Jeremy always felt protective and like the people attacking Michael were attacking him. 

He pulled his blog back up, a new blog post idea popping into his head. Jeremy had only typed out the title (“Zelda Cheat Codes and Glitches: You Guys Are Overreacting!”… It was a working title, okay?) when Christine came out of the theater, absolutely buzzing. She practically leapt across the lobby to get to Jeremy.

“How’d it go?” He asked, though he really didn’t have to. She was practically bouncing to the ceiling, almost vibrating out of her skin. There was a huge smile on her face.

“Amazing,” she breathed, clutching her hands over her heart. “The director looked really impressed! I think I might actually have a shot at this one.”

“I know you killed it,” Jeremy said. He shut his laptop, temporarily forgetting about internet drama. He stood up and gave his best friend a huge hug. “So, don’t you owe me twenty bucks?”

Christine smacked him lightly on the arm. “I never took that bet!” Jeremy laughed, stepping back and collecting his stuff. 

“Just checking.”

They decided to go to the dining hall for dinner. It was a buffet style place, where you used your meal plan to get inside and then you could eat as much as you wanted. Christine announced that she was going to eat all the cake they had in the dessert booth as a reward.

“You’re gonna get a stomachache,” Jeremy pointed out. Christine huffed.

“No way! I’m not a baby, like you,” she said, poking him hard in the side. They dropped their stuff off in one of the booths and headed to collect their food.

Jeremy made it back to their table before Christine did, with a plate full of pizza and breadsticks. He had a salad in the other hand, though he knew he’d barely touch it. Still, he had to _try_ to be healthy or else his dad would get on his case.

He opened his laptop back up, frowning when he saw his new blog post, titled and waiting to be written. Right, he’d almost forgotten about all that.

“What’s up?” Christine asked as she slid into the opposite side of the booth. Her arms were full with her own plate of pizza, a plate of french fries, and a plate that was piled high with slices of yellow cake. Jeremy opened his mouth to answer, but stopped and frowned when he saw her food.

“You’re gonna make yourself sick,” he told her. She waved a hand dismissively.

“I’ll be fine. Now, what’s got your panties in a twist?” Christine took a big forkful of cake and sighed contently.

“So Michael posted this new Legend of Zelda video with this really weird cheat at the end, where you can basically skip forward in the game whenever you want to,” Jeremy explained between bites of pizza, “and I guess people are giving him shit for it? Like he’s literally taking the video down and reuploading without the cheat because of the fuss everyone’s making and it’s so stupid! Like, leave the guy alone. Like they all haven’t used cheats in a video game before, god.”

“You sound pretty passionate, Jer,” Christine said lightly. She wiggled her eyebrows. “You mad that people are being mean to your man?” Jeremy rolled his eyes at her, but that didn’t stop the blush that crept over his cheeks.

“Yeah,” he mumbled. “I’m gonna write a blog post about it, but I don’t know how to word it so it’s not some incoherent rant, you know.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” Christine said kindly. “You’re a good writer and you’ve been doing it for a long time. If you want, I can help you edit it before you post?”

Jeremy smiled. “That’d be great, thanks.” Christine waved a hand at his laptop.

“Well, then, get writing! I have homework later, so the quicker I can help you, the quicker I can get my Lit essay out of the way.”

“I can help you with Lit,” Jeremy said, “if you help me with my Psych lab. I don’t get APA format at _all_.”

Christine nodded, taking a huge bite of cake. “Deal. Now, get writing. We have a lot to do tonight.” Jeremy nodded, his fingers hovering over the keyboard. He took a deep breath and decided to just type, see what came out, and go from there.

Yeah, that seemed like a plan.


	2. The Blog Post

Zelda Cheat Codes and Glitches: You Guys Are Overreacting!

Cheat codes have always been a part of gaming, way back to when the only video games were in arcades and all you had to choose from was Pac Man and Galaga (awesome games, of course, but where would we be without GTA and AoTD?). Cheats and hacks and glitches have always been around. Where would we be without MissingE in Pokémon, for instance?

Cheats are harmless, so long as you’re playing by yourself. Video games are supposed to be fun and cheats add a new spin to them, which is why they’re so popular in the first place. Everyone uses cheats and, to be quite honest, if you say you don’t then you, my friend, are a liar.

So why does this community think it’s alright to bully and berate someone just because they shared a cheat with their audience. Michael Mell (of the channel gaymers on Youtube, if you somehow did not know) shared a really awesome cheat for Ocarina of Time, which I personally had never even seen before, and yet was somehow hit with such backlash that he had to take down the video! I can get not liking cheats, especially on like this, as it is on the extreme side. But that is just… ridiculous. It is utterly ridiculous that Michael had to reupload his video without the hack, just because some of his viewers (and newcomers, as his Ocarina series seems to garner more attention than his other videos) didn’t like it.

That’s not constructive, you guys. That’s bullying. That’s not “calling him out”, that’s abuse. There is no reason for anyone to have reacted they way they they did to the video (sorry I can’t link, but it’s already been taken down). It was a harmless hack and a cool tidbit that could even make playing Ocarina that much more fun. Luckily, I wrote down the code before the video was taken down, so I can still try it out for myself. Maybe I’ll even make a post about it (suck on that :p).

So just… mind your own business?? Is it really that hard? How does it affect you, truly, if people know about this cheat? Is it going to affect your own personal enjoyment of a single-player game? No, it’s not. Go and play your own game with no cheats, if you’re so high and mighty. Just leave Michael alone and out of it. He’s a good guy and doesn’t deserve this kind of crap, okay?

—

So, yeah, Jeremy kept the title. The only other one he could think of was LEAVE MICHAEL ALONE and he thought that wouldn’t go over very well. He knew that his little blog post wasn’t going to do much; it would even reach a quarter of Michael’s followers. But still, he had to say something. When it came to the internet, positive people tended to outnumber the negative ones, but the negative ones were louder and so it looked like there were more of them. The positive people needed to speak up more often, so that’s what Jeremy was doing.

Christine had been the one to decide to keep his emotional rant near the end. She claimed that it “makes the piece feel more authentic. It helps show you’re an actual person, Jeremy, and not just some robot behind a screen”. So against what might have been Jeremy’s better judgement, his embarrassing rant about leaving Michael the fuck alone stayed in the blog post and was put online for the world to see. Or, rather, his 943 followers (damn, he’d lost a couple throughout the day!).

Jeremy woke up in the morning at his usual time of 10 o’clock to get ready for his 11 o’clock lecture. He stretched in bed, groaning quietly, before grabbing his phone.

**NOTIFICATION FROM YOUTUBE**  
New video from gaymers: Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time #4 (reupload)

**NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: video is back up if you wanna do me a favor and watch it again!! love u guys xx

**NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: do you guys want another vlog today, or is two in a row too much??

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: wanna get food before class?

Jeremy pushed himself with one arm so he was sitting up and answered Christine first.

**Me** : do u even have to ask???

**Christine** : lol how could i forgot who i’m talking to? i’ll be there in 10

Jeremy yawned. God, even 10 o’clock was too early to wake up. How had he ever managed to go to school at seven in the morning in high school? It was honestly a mystery. He didn’t have much time until Christine arrived (she was annoyingly, dependably punctual as a person), so he got dressed quickly, throwing on the nearest T-shirt (Pokémon, not bad) and pair of jeans. He hurried out to the bathroom to brush his teeth.

He didn’t think once that morning about the blog post.

He did, however, put on Michael’s reuploaded video and let it play without really watching. Sure, he may have glanced at it once or twice to stare at Michael’s face (a fact he would never admit to another living soul, save maybe Christine), but for the most part he paid it no mind. It was a lot shorter without the cheat code part, so he even replayed it in an attempt to help Michael with his number of views, all before Christine arrived.

Christine was short, that much was alway a given about her. But she always made sure that short did _not_ equal unnoticeable. Today, she was wearing a pretty fall-themed dress with a very…. ahem… _loud_ orange leaf pattern, a knitted green scarf, and her favorite pair of kitten tights. She loved to dress on the eccentric side (fashionable, she claimed, though no one else would agree), just so she could stand out a bit more.

Jeremy gave her a sleepy smile when he opened his door, slinging his backpack over his shoulders.

“Hey!” Christine chirped, backing up so Jeremy could walk into the hall. She held two Starbucks cups in her hands and held out one for Jeremy.

“Thanks,” he said gratefully, taking a long sip. He wasn’t the biggest fan of pumpkin spice, but it was the season, so why not? “I’ll buy you one tomorrow.” Christine waved a hand carelessly, but Jeremy hated when she spent her meal plan money on him, so he knew he’d find a way to pay her back.

They ended up in the Student Center, which was more of a common area for students to hang out, study, and go to the student bookstore. It did have the only breakfast bar on campus that served bacon, though, so it was Jeremy and Christine’s favorite place to eat in the morning. They managed to show up only fifteen minutes before the breakfast bar closed for the day.

“Excuse me, thank you, out of my way!” Christine maneuvered the crowd nimbly, taking advantage of her small stature to slip through the crowd of people to get to the breakfast bar. Jeremy gawked, coughing on his coffee when she actually dropped to all fours and crawled between someone’s legs. Jeremy hung back, sipping on his coffee and allowing Christine to take the lead. He never understood why the Student Center got so crowded so early, but he didn’t question it. It just annoyed him. Right then, it was just the obstacle blocking him from his breakfast, and a tired Jeremy was a grumpy Jeremy.

Huh. Maybe that’s why Christine insisted on buying him coffee so often.

By the time Jeremy managed to make it to the breakfast bar, Christine already had her plate completely full and a plate for him. It already had the bacon on it, but she’d left it for him to get the rest of his food.

“We really need to get up earlier,” he commented lightly, using a pair of tongs to grab a single pancake from the pile.

Christine snorted. “I get up at eight every day, Jer. _You’re_ the one who cuts it close every day.” She reached over and pinched him lightly in the side. He yelped, jumping back.

“Hey! You almost made me drop my bacon,” he complained. Christine burst into giggles, unable to control herself as she handed her student ID to the cashier. 

“Meal plan, please,” she said through her giggles. Turning to Jeremy, she asked, “did you intend to quote that vine, or was it just a happy coincidence?”

Jeremy blushed a little. “I may or may not have fallen asleep watching vine compilations last night.” Christine’s laughs just got louder and Jeremy rolled his eyes. He handed his ID to the cashier. “Sorry, just ignore her. Meal plan, please.”

They didn’t have long to eat before they had to leave for the one class that they both shared. It was a GenEd course- Greek History. Jeremy thought it was really interesting, except that you had to pay attention for every single second of the class. He just didn’t have that kind of attention span. Christine, on the other hand, _adored_ the class (and the professor; she thought he was the most adorable old man) and always took diligent notes.

“The one good thing about ADD,” she’d told Jeremy as she’d showcased her 103% on the first test. After that, Jeremy took to copying Christine’s notes after class rather than taking his own.

Just as they were finishing up their food, Christine reminding Jeremy that it took ten minutes to walk to class, Jeremy’s phone buzzed.

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
5 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

Huh. He usually didn’t get so many comments so quickly! Maybe Christine should help him write his blog posts more often.

—

Jeremy wasn’t a bad student. Honest. He was actually a pretty good student, managing to keep a 3.5 GPA all through high school and college with relative ease. So, he really wasn’t a bad student. He just… tended to rely on Christine a little more than he should. And that was how the two of them ended up in the back of the classroom for Greek History that day, with Jeremy watching Youtube videos the entire time.

Christine had just rolled her eyes, clearly legitimately annoyed with him. She didn’t often get annoyed with him, not for real, but whenever he slacked off in school it just brought out the “Mom Friend” side of her. Though she’d given up lecturing him on it long ago. She’d also given up on withholding her notes from him, as he knew how to guilt her into sharing them.

Jeremy didn’t even bother to pretend to take notes and doodle in his notebook, like he usually did. He left his notebook in his backpack and plugged his headphones into his phone. Just the professor began his lecture on the Bronze Age, Jeremy clicked on a video to watch.

Okay, it’s totally not pathetic to rewatch old vlogs of Michael’s. It’s totally not. And he wouldn’t, normally, but there was nothing new in his subscription box and he wanted to watch _something_ , so really did he have a choice but to pick one of Michael’s old vlogs to watch? No, no he did not.

He clicked on one entitled “Epic apartment tour!!”, which was about a year old, from when Michael first moved from the suburbs of New Jersey to New York City. God, they had so much in common. It almost pained Jeremy that they had grown up so close to each other and now lived in the same city, yet he had never once met Michael or even spotted him in public (not that he’d _ever_ have the courage to approach Michael if he did, but it’d be nice to see him from a distance, too).

“Hey, guys!” Michael’s voice was loud in Jeremy’s ear. Quickly, he turned the volume down a bit, just loud enough that it drowned out the professor’s voice. Christine side-eyed him, but kept on task with her notes. “I know, I know. You’ve all been begging for a real apartment tour, and now that the place is kind of actually set up, I thought I’d show you around! It’s still so weird, being in my own apartment. I don’t know what I’d do if Jake didn’t live in the same building…”

Jeremy smiled as Michael moved the camera to show Jake Dillinger, one of Michael’s best friends. Jake waved a little, distracted by a video game that sounded a lot like Grand Theft Auto, before flipping the camera off lazily. 

“Hey!” Michael cried, whipping the camera so it was back on him. “I got young viewers, man.”

“Ah, like they’ve never seen the bird before,” Jake said, laughing. He was still off camera, but Michael just rolled his eyes. With his free hand, he pushed his glasses up his nose.

“Dude, he’s gotta make sure their mommies don’t forbid them from watching his videos!” Michael groaned as Rich Goranski, the remaining member of their trio, poked his head into frame. Pretty much all you could see was the red stripe in his hair and his eyes; he was at least a full head shorter than Michael, and Michael loved to lord that over him.

Jake was a Youtuber as well, though Jeremy had never paid him much attention. He didn’t mind when Jake was in Michael’s videos or anything, but he didn’t go out of his way to watch any of Jake’s videos (unless Michael was in them… Jeremy really had no shame). Rich, on the other hand, was not a Youtuber, but a childhood friend of Jake’s. Once Jake and Michael had met through Youtube, they’d become something of an inseparable trio. Rich was in so many of Michael’s videos that he might as well have been a Youtuber as well. He had enough of his own fans, anyway.

As the video went on with Michael lamenting choosing to do his apartment tour with his friends present, a notification popped up on top of the video.

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
10 new followers (click for more)

Jeremy raised an eyebrow. Ten new followers, all at once? That was weird. He swiped the notification out of the way and continued watching his video, deciding to look into it later.

Class went on and the video ended. Jeremy clicked on another old one of Michael’s. “The best friend(s) tag”. It was the first one of Michael’s that Rich was in and one of Michael’s vlog channel’s most watched videos.

**NOTIFICATION FROM YOUTUBE**  
New video from gaymersvlog: More about Zelda (plus super cool unboxing w/jake!!)

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
4 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
18 new followers (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: another vlog??? check it out!

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
7 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

Jeremy was almost annoyed by all the notifications interrupting his video-watching, but he was super confused. How had he gained twenty-eight followers in the last hour? And he already had sixteen comments on his new post, despite that he usually can barely manage to get five on any other post? That was weirder than weird.

Finally, he had to stop the video and pull out his headphones. He was getting so many notifications so quickly that he couldn’t hear the vlog anymore. He wanted to watch Michael’s new vlog, but he wanted to wait until he could watch it without these distractions.

“One of these days,” Christine said after class, before they parted ways, “you’re gonna actually pay attention in class. Michael can wait, Jeremy.”

“What do I need to pay attention in class for when I have you?” Jeremy asked sweetly, but Christine wasn’t having it. “Ugh, fine. I’ll pay attention next week.”

“Promise?” Christine, just as she’d done ever since Jeremy had known her, held out her pinky. Jeremy unquestioningly linked his own pinky around hers.

“Promise,” he said begrudgingly. Finally, she seemed satisfied and walked off with a bounce in her step.

—

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
20 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
12 new followers (click for more)

—

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
17 new followers (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
29 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

—

Unfortunately for Jeremy, his next class was immediately after Greek History and it was one he couldn’t mess around in. So instead, he just had to sit and watch as the notifications from his blog kept rolling in, showing higher and higher numbers of comments and followers, and he had no idea why. It was driving him nuts!

Finally, he couldn’t take it anymore and he shoved his phone into the depths of his backpack. Jeremy hated putting his phone in his backpack, paranoid that his heavy textbooks would crack the screen, but with desperate times comes desperate measures. He needed to concentrate; he didn’t have anyone in this class to help him if he spaced out.

—

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
33 new followers (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
45 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: will someone PLEASE tell rich that flaming cheetos are superior…

**NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: @goranskisrich FLAMING CHEETOS ARE HEAVEN YOU HEATHEN

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
12 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
31 new followers (click for more)

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: jer????

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: are u still in class???

**New Message**  
Christine: ok nvm idc that ur still in class ANSWER ME NOW

**NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
26 new comments on your latest post (click for more)  
…

—

Jeremy raised his eyebrows at all the notifications on his phone when he finally got out of class. The majority of them were from Blogspot, coming in every three minutes or so with an uptick of followers and comments on his Zelda blog post.

He was shocked to see Christine’s texts and cursed under his breath. He ducked out the door of the building and leaned against the wall, calling her. He didn’t know what sort of emergency would warrant Christine telling him to call her during class, but he knew it was something seriously important.

“Jeremy!” Christine shouted when she answered the phone. “Oh my god!”

“What’s wrong?” Jeremy asked worriedly. He ran a hand through his hair and tugged hard on the end. “Did you get a callback or something?” He hoped it was only Christine’s excitement over a callback.

“They’re not posted yet, but that’s not important right now,” Christine said dismissively. Jeremy raised his eyebrows even though she couldn’t see him.

“Not important? Who are you and what have you done with my best friend?” Jeremy asked, only half joking. Christine was the very last person who would ever call getting a callback for a show unimportant.

Christine took a deep breath, which quite frankly worried Jeremy. “Have you seen Michael’s new video?” Jeremy blinked.

_What?_

“Um, no? I’ve been in class,” Jeremy said baldly. “Besides, I’ve been getting so many notifications from Blogspot, I couldn’t have watched it anyway.”

“Yeah, there’s a reason for that,” Christine said. “Just- go watch the video. Now.”

“Chris, you’re worrying me,” he said. “What’s going on?”

“Let’s just say your blog has reached some new eyes in the past few hours, okay?”

Jeremy looked down at his phone, watching in real time as the notifications from blogspot rolled in. New eyes.

Yeah, no kidding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> College life is boring, guys, so I hope this chapter was actually somewhat interesting lol


	3. More About Zelda

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gah, I'm so sorry about the long break between chapters! I swear I'm gonna do my best to make sure it doesn't happen again. I hope you like the chapter, though!

Jeremy practically ran back to his dorm room, not fully understanding why Christine was freaking out over Michael’s new video. She barely even watched his stuff. He could _almost_ understand if it was something to do with Pinkberry (Christine has written fanfiction about them… she would probably have a full-blow meltdown if they actually got together in real life), but Michael? It was the cherry on top of an already weird day.

His phone was still going off, buzzing like crazy in his pocket, but he was able to ignore it. His mind was racing too much as it was, so it was surprisingly easy to ignore.

He practically threw himself on his bed and opened his laptop. As soon as the school’s incredibly slow WiFi connected, he pulled up Youtube and clicked on Michael’s newest vlog, “More about Zelda (plus super cool unboxing w/jake!!)”.

The video loaded after five painfully long seconds and showed Michael sitting on his couch in his usual sit-down video spot. Jeremy couldn’t help but think that he looked really cute. His hair was sticking up like it did when he ran his fingers through it a lot and he was wearing a Pac Man T-shirt, which just made Jeremy little nerd-heart sing.

“Hey guys,” Michael said with his usual pep and vigor. “So I wanted to talk about what happened with yesterday’s main channel video a bit more at length, so that’s mostly what this vlog is gonna be about. If you don’t care, feel free to skip ahead to the unboxing Jake and I are gonna do.” Michael gave a little laugh.

Jeremy’s phone buzzed again. Sighing loudly, he paused the video and grabbed his phone.

 **NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
21 new followers (click for more)

 **NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
15 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

The list went on. Jeremy didn’t see anything that _wasn’t_ from Blogspot, so he turned his phone all the way off. There was finally silence, no annoying, constantly vibrating phone anymore. It was lovely. More content, Jeremy hit play again.

“Hell yeah, we are!” Jake shouted from somewhere off camera. There was a small crash. “Oh, shit!” Michael sighed, pushing his glasses up his nose.

“Could you, like, not break my stuff for five minutes? Please?” 

“It was an accident!”

“Like when you broke the microwave?”

“That made for a good video, and you know it!” Michael rolled his eyes, but it was clear that he wasn’t really angry. Jeremy remembered the video where Jake accidentally blew up Michael’s brand new microwave. 

“Okay, _anyway_ ,” Michael said, turning his attention back to the camera. “Yesterday I posted a video playing Ocarina and at the end I showed this really weird cheat I found out about in the depths of Reddit. I know,” Michael sighed dramatically, “don’t judge me. Reddit sucks for just about everything, but it’s the best place to find weird shit on video games. It’s the bane of my existence.”

Jeremy snorted. He still wasn’t getting why Christine was freaking out over the video, but from what he could tell there was still about eight minutes of video before it switched to Michael and Jake unboxing. Was the unboxing the thing Christine was freaking out about? 

Jeremy hovered the mouse over the bar, about to skip ahead to the unboxing. If that wasn’t it, he could just come back and watch the rest.

“I don’t know if I was in the right or not,” Michael was saying. He was fiddling with his hands and Jeremy knew that meant he felt nervous. “I mean, I still don’t quite get why everyone freaked out over this specific cheat, but I’m trying to listen. Still, I’m lucky enough to have some pretty great fans who stuck up for me. Especially this guy with a blog called eightbitzombie. He- what’s his name?”

Michael started scrolling on his phone, but Jeremy was not hearing anything from the video anymore. He sat frozen on his bed, feeling as if a rug had just been yanked out from underneath his feet.

 _His_ blog was called eightbitzombie.

“Jeremy!” Jeremy jumped as Michael practically shouted his name from the screen. “Yeah, Jeremy from eightbitzombie on Blogspot wrote this really awesome blog post about the whole incident and cheats in general. You know what, I’ll link the post down below if you want to go check it out. It’s actually a pretty cool blog- I can’t believe I haven’t heard of it before. So, Jeremey, if you’re watching, thank you so much for your support and your post. You’re really awesome, dude.”

Michael kept talking, but Jeremy could hear anymore. His blood was rushing in his ears. His heart was pounding a million miles a minute. He felt like he couldn’t breathe, like the Earth had stopped spinning and was spinning faster than ever all at the same time.

Michael Mell knew who he was.

Michael, his favorite Youtuber and quite possibly one of his favorite people in the entire world, read his blog post. He _liked_ Jeremy’s blog! He’d called Jeremy awesome.

Without really watching, Jeremy saw the video shift from the sit-down chat to the unboxing with Jake.

It made sense now, at least. All the new followers and comments on his blog. Michael had two million subscribers on his vlog channel alone- this was probably only the most dedicated fraction of his following that was checking out Jeremy’s blog right now. And it was still so overwhelming.

He reached blindly for his phone, confused for far too long as to why it wasn’t turning on. Finally, he got the phone on. Where was Christine right now? It was Thursday, and about four in the afternoon. Ugh, Jeremy couldn’t think; he couldn’t recall anything about his best friend’s schedule. He called her anyway.

“Did you watch it?” Christine said in lieu of answering. She was whispering, but Jeremy barely registered it.

“Chris?” Jeremy asked. “Am I dreaming? Did that really just happen?”

“It’s real,” Christine confirmed. “Trust me, I was just as shocked about it as you are.”

“I… I highly doubt that.”

“Yeah. Never mind, you sound totally freaked.”

“Why are you whispering?” Jeremy asked finally. He rubbed his eyes, watching at the end screen of the video. It was a piece of fan art- Michael sitting on a precarious stack of gaming consoles and holding up a peace sign.

“I’m at work, Jer.” Christine worked in the Writing Center in the school library, where she helped students with their essays and lab reports. “I’m not supposed to be on the phone. Do you wanna come here and ‘work’ on that Psych lab you mentioned?”

“I don’t… Yeah. I’ll be there in fifteen.”

—

The Writing Center was pretty dead when Jeremy showed up, so he made a beeline over to where Christine was sitting and plopped down in front of her. He set his phone on the table with a loud thud. Two seconds later, it buzzed.

“I’m going insane,” he said plainly. “I mean- how? How? How, Chris, how?”

Christine shook her head. “I don’t know, but isn’t it kind of exciting? Weren’t you just complaining the other day how Michael didn’t even know you exist, and now he’s promoting your blog to all his followers?”

“I- I-” Jeremy stammered, drumming his fingers on the table. Christine was writing out the Psych lab form (“Just a baseline, you still have to do the actual work, Jeremy!”), mostly to keep up appearances. They’d gotten in trouble more than once for Jeremy hanging out when Christine was working, despite the fact that no one was there.

Christine grabbed Jeremy’s hand, halting his fingers, and squeezed. “Hey, don’t be so freaked out, okay?”

“Me? Freaked?” Jeremy asked, huffing as if he were insulted. “You’re the one who called me in the middle of class, freaking out over it.”

Christine grimaced. “Yeah, not my best move. But you would have been mad if I hadn’t, and you know it.” 

Jeremy couldn’t argue, because he knew it was true.

“I just-” he sighed. “It’s embarrassing, you know? And weird.”

“You shouldn’t be embarrassed. You’re a fan. Michael sees the shit people post about him all the time. Did you know there’s a theory that he, Jake, and Rich are all dating?” Christine rolled her eyes. Jeremy raised an eyebrow.

“Because that’s so much more of a stretch than Chloe and Brooke dating?”

“That’s different!”

“Sure it is,” Jeremy said teasingly. “Whatever you say.”

Christine always had a way of making Jeremy feel better, even when his anxiety had a different plan. She did it without even really realizing, and that was the amazing part. Sometimes, Jeremy really didn’t know why Christine put up with him, but he was so grateful that she did.

They were quiet a moment and Jeremy felt peaceful.

 **NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
19 new followers (click for more)

 **NOTIFICATION FROM BLOGSPOT**  
43 new comments on your latest post (click for more)

Yeah. That didn’t last long at all.

Jeremy picked up his phone and dismissed all of his notifications. Christine was still holding his hand and squeezed again. He squeezed back.

“You know,” he said, trying to keep his voice light, “at this point, I’m kind of afraid to read these comments.”

“Ignore them, then,” she replied simply.

“I will.” Jeremy waited a beat. “I’ve written so many posts about him, Chris. Like, my crush is _so_ obvious from my blog. And he’s seen it. He was never supposed to actually see it.”

Christine graciously didn’t remind Jeremy that he chose to put that stuff on the Internet for the world to see. Instead, she said, “He probably didn’t see much.”

“He said he really liked my blog.”

“That’s a good thing!”

“Yeah, but it also means he read more than one post. If he’d just read the Zelda one, maybe it wouldn’t be so mortifying.”

“But he liked what he saw,” Christine reminded him, finally abandoning the homework to look at him face on. “I know it’s kind of embarrassing, but you got noticed! You got a direct shoutout from Michael freaking Mell, Jeremy. That’s amazing.”

“God, why do you have to be such a good friend? You’re making me feel bad over here.” 

“Oh boo hoo on you,” she said. She pushed the lab form over to him. “You can finish the rest of that yourself, can’t you?” He took it, looking over the work she’d done. God, he really didn’t deserve to have Christine as a friend.

“You’re the best, you know that?” Christine pretended like she was surprised by the compliment. 

Jeremy hung around the library for another hour and a half until Christine finally got off of work and they went to get food. They grabbed some burritos, chips, and guacamole from the dining hall and took it back to Jeremy’s room to eat.

Jeremy complained as they walked back to his building, both of them holding bags of food and drinks. His phone was still, somehow, buzzing incessantly.

“Why don’t you just turn your Blogspot notifications off?” Christine suggested. If Jeremy’s hands weren’t full, he would have slapped himself in the forehead.

“God, I feel stupid.”

“Aw, don’t feel dumb, Jer. Just know that I’m always smarter than you.” Jeremy shot Christine a disbelieving look and she returned with a rather haughty one. They both dissolved into giggles as they entered the dorm building.

They made a sort of spread of their food on Jeremy’s bed and dug in. Christine, being the thoughtful person that she was, managed to line everything with the copious amounts of napkins that she’d stolen from the dining hall so that the food wouldn’t get all over Jeremy’s comforter.

Christine propped open Jeremy’s laptop (she knew all of his passwords, so she logged right in with no issues) and pulled up Youtube.

“Ooh, Brooke posted her video today,” Christine said excitedly. She looked over at Jeremy, puppy dog eyes already in place. He just rolled his eyes and waved his hand. She squealed quietly and opened the video, putting it on fullscreen before it even loaded.

“Hello, Youtube!” Brooke was a pretty blonde girl who always seemed incredibly chipper all the time. Jeremy would never tell Christine, but Brooke sometimes (read: always) gave him a headache. Chloe was okay, but there was just something about Brooke that didn’t gel well with him. “So, I’ve been getting a lot of questions lately about how I do my hair…”

Jeremy just sort of tuned the video out while Christine watched. He ate his two burritos and more than his fair share of the chips and guac. Christine would complain once she noticed, but whatever.

His phone buzzed again and his stomach dropped. He’d turned the Blogspot notifications off, so why was his phone going off again?

Jeremy picked up his phone, looked at the screen, and threw it across the room.

“What the fuck, Jer?”

Christine wasn’t the type to swear a whole lot, which really just went to show how shocked she was. Jeremy just stared at the floor, where his phone had landed. The screen was lit up and although the phone was too far away for him to actually read it, he felt like he words were burned into his eyes.

 **NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael is now following you!

Christine stared at Jeremy expectantly, but he just stared at his phone. His head was spinning. He didn’t know what to think.

“Jer? Seriously, what is it?” Christine asked, sounding worried. She put a hand on his shoulder. “Jeremy Heere, I swear to god-”

The phone buzzed again, reminding him of his notification. Christine narrowed her eyes and climbed off the bed. She picked up his phone and read it for herself. 

Her jaw dropped open.

“Oh my god.”

“Oh my god,” Jeremy echoed faintly.

“Oh my _god_!” Christine looked like she couldn’t believe what she’d just seen. “Jeremy! What the hell?”

“How am I supposed to know?” He cried. “I don’t even have my Twitter on my blog-” He paused, a horrible thought popping into his head. The blood drained from his face.

“What?” Christine asked.

“I haven’t mentioned my Twitter handle on my blog since my first post,” he answered. “Oh my god, he’s read every fucking post on my blog.”

“Aw,” Christine cooed, her face melting into a warm smile. “He really likes you, then!”

“My life is over.”

Christine climbed back on the bed, sitting in front of Jeremy on her knees. “I think you’re being a little overdramatic, Jer. And that’s coming from _me_.” Christine was, of course, the queen of being overdramatic.

“Michael- he’s seen _everything_ then. Everything, Christine! Every stupid post I posted when I was sixteen and didn’t know what sort of content was worth putting online, so I put everything! It’s all so cringey, I can’t even stand to go back and see them in order to delete them!”

“But he liked it anyway,” Christine said in a cute voice, poking him in the belly. “Maybe Michael’s got his own little crush.”

The absurdity of her statement was enough to pull Jeremy out of the thought spiral he was trapped in. “Yeah, right. That would be an cold day in Hell.”

“You’re Jewish. You don’t believe in Hell.”

“Makes it even more unbelievable, doesn’t it?”

Christine’s eyes lit up and Jeremy just knew she had a horrible idea. 

“You should DM him!” Yeah, see, completely terrible. Jeremy ripped his phone out of her hands before she could message Michael herself.

“Yeah, or I could die. Let’s go with plan B, alright?” Christine rolled her eyes.

“Just send him a little message, thanking him for the promo and the follow! He probably won’t even see it.”

“So then, why would I do it?” Jeremy opened the notification to see in the Twitter app that yes, indeed, Michael fucking Mell was following him on Twitter. He immediately had the urge to delete every tweet he’d ever posted in his life.

“Because it’s polite and I said so.” Christine put on her best Mom voice. Jeremy shook his head, but she put on her matching Mom face and Jeremy was a goner. Christine knew all of his buttons and how to get him to do what she wanted. It was a hazard of being best friends for so long.

“Fine. Just one message and then I delete my Twitter, right?” Jeremy asked brightly. Christine glared at him. “Joking.”

He went to Michael’s profile and clicked the button that read “Message”. With shaky fingers, he began to type.

 **@jeremyisheere** : hey i just wanted to say thanks for the follow!! and the mention in your vlog

“Ooh, tell him that it meant a lot to you!” Christine said.

“What?” Jeremy squawked indignantly. “Now way!” Christine sighed loudly, as if it physically pained her to not be obeyed. She did it again, throwing herself down on the bed dramatically. Her third loud sigh was the winner.

“God, fine!” Christine cheered, sitting back up so fast that Jeremy got whiplash _for_ her.

 **@jeremyisheere** : hey i just wanted to say thanks for the follow!! and the mention in your vlog, it really meant a lot.

He sent it before Christine could force him to add anything else that might embarrass him. Jeremy had been embarrassed enough for one day, thank you very much.

“There,” he said. “Done. And he’ll probably never see it, so there’s nothing to worry about, right?”

Christine nodded resolutely. “Right!”

A second later, his phone buzzed in his hand. Jeremy dropped his gaze and his eyes widened.

**@gaymersmichael** : no problem, dude! your blog is really awesome and it was so cool of you to make that post- i /had/ to mention it! 


	4. Coffee Date

Jeremy had kept his cool for about half a second before he’d gone into another meltdown. There was actual crying involved; it wasn’t a pretty sight. Luckily, Christine was an expert in mothering Jeremy by now (she’d gotten a crash course when his mom had left sophomore year of high school), so she knew just what to do.

“Sh, Jer, calm down,” she had said in her best, most soothing voice. She’d stroked his hair softly. “Don’t freak out. So he saw your DM? It’s fine.”

“I have to reply,” Jeremy’s said, panicked. “What do I say? He’s gonna think I ignored him and-” Christine then took the phone out of his hand and threw it clean across the room. Thank god for the phone case, otherwise that poor phone would have been shattered after the day it’d had.

Christine, after some arguing, had managed to convince Jeremy to calm down and watch a couple episodes of Voltron with her before deciding how to proceed with the whole Michael situation. Christine, though, was an old woman at heart and somehow fell asleep after two episodes. 

Jeremy had paused the show when he’d noticed she was asleep; he knew she’d be mad if he watched any more without her. He sat there for a few minutes, just feeling comfortable. Even asleep, Christine had this presence that made Jeremy feel at home.

Finally, he made a choice. He was being given the ultimate opportunity, wasn’t he? His favorite Youtuber, this guy that he had a crush on and sort of even looked up to, had noticed him. Like Christine had pointed out, it was kind of the dream. And he knew, deep down, that he could let it end here. He’d said thanks, Michael had said you’re welcome. That could be it. End of story.

But Jeremy knew that if he let it end here- if he didn’t at least _try_ to extend the narrative, then he was going to regret it.

Carefully, so as to not wake Christine, Jeremy slid the laptop off his lap and crept out of the bed. Christine snorted softly, but just rolled over so she was laying on her stomach where he’d just been sitting. Jeremy crossed his room and picked his phone up off the floor. No cracks in the screen, thank god. His dad would have killed him.

The Twitter app was still open. Heart pounding in his chest, Jeremy sat in his desk chair and reopened his message log with Michael. It was roughly two hours since Michael had responded. 

Jeremy’s tongue stuck out of the corner of his lips as his bit it lightly, trying to think of what to say. God, Christine was so much better at this kind of stuff than he was, but he knew that if this was going to happen (would it even? Wasn’t it likely that Michael wouldn’t respond again, or possibly not even see another message?), he needed to do it on his own. He couldn’t rely on his best friend for everything, no matter how much he wished he could.

**@jeremyisheere** : well i still really appreciate it.. you can probably tell, but i’ve been a fan for quite a while now

He cringed a little at the message, but sent it anyway.

He sat there for about a minute, waiting to see if he’d get another immediate response. It didn’t happen. Jeremy bit on his bottom lip and nodded to himself. He could be a normal human being and wait for a reply. He set the phone down on the desk and spun in his desk chair.

It was about three minutes later when his phone buzzed.

—

Jeremy was up all night messaging Michael, which was something he _never_ thought would ever happen. Once the awkward fan/idol conversation had gotten out of the way and Michael had asked Jeremy about how he managed to pass AoTD’s fifth level in only two days, the conversation had flowed and the time had passed without Jeremy even realizing.

He was struggling to keep his eyes open when he heard Christine stir and wake up. Her short hair was a mess, sticking up in all directions. Jeremy snorted; it looked like a bird had nested there in the night.

“What are you doin’ up so early?” She mumbled, sounding as if she were still half asleep. She probably was.

Jeremy yawned. “Uh, I never went to bed.”

Even through her sleepy daze, Christine managed to give him a Mom glare. “You’re lucky it’s Friday. But that’s still really unhealthy, Jer.”

“I know. I didn’t mean to, but…” Unable to contain himself, Jeremy climbed over the bed and thrust his phone in her face. Her eye crossed, trying to see what was on the screen.

“It is too early for this shit,” she muttered to herself, taking the phone from Jeremy’s hand and holding it back so she could actually read it. She gasped loudly, her free hand flying to her mouth.

“I know!” Jeremy said, running his hand through his hair. “We’ve been talking, like, all night. It’s crazy.”

Christine scrolled up, looking at all of the messages between Michael and Jeremy. She mostly skimmed them, but took it as her right as the Best Friend™ to read any of the messages that caught her eye.

**@gaymersmichael** : everyone knows aotd is the best console zombie game!! anyone who disagrees is lying to themselves

**@jeremyisheere** : nah i had like one friend in hs, but it’s cool she’s pretty great

**@gaymersmichael** : really?? damn we grew up like 2 cities away from each other that’s crazy

**@jeremyisheere** : but like PLEASE tell me you were team cap. cause otherwise i can’t be friends w you anymore

**@gaymersmichael** : ok i’ve always been the red power ranger ever since i was a kid. red’s just my trademark yanno

**@jeremyisheere** : when i was 8 i honestly thought i was a waterbender so i can’t judge

“You guys are weird,” Christine said with the utmost affection in her voice. She looked up at Jeremy, a smile on her face. “And he totally has a crush on you, too.”

Jeremy blushed, rubbing his nose. “Yeah, that’s not possible.”

She raised her eyebrows and waved his phone in his face. “Hon? People don’t stay up talking with someone they don’t like. The proof is in the pudding.”

Jeremy made a face. “What kind of saying is that?”

“I don’t know, I just heard it somewhere!” Christine shook her head. “That’s not the point. He totally likes you.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Jeremy said firmly. “If anything, we might be friends-”

“Oh, you’re definitely at least friends by this point,” she cut in.

“- but it’s basically impossible for someone like him to like someone like me, so…” Jeremy pressed on. Ugh, he was tired. And now that he wasn’t constantly messaging Michael, his euphoria was dissipating and he was ready to crawl into bed and sleep for a week. He definitely was not built for all-nighters, no matter what the college stereotypes said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Christine asked. She crossed her arms over her chest, trying her best to look intimidating. Her bedhead and general sleepiness kind of undercut the effect, though.

Jeremy shrugged, crawling so he could climb under the covers next to her. “I’m a nobody, you know? A loser. And he’s- well, he’s kind of a loser, too, but he’s the kind that people like. He’s _somebody_. And somebodies don’t have crushes on nobodies, it just doesn’t work like that.”

And because the universe (or maybe it was just Michael?) liked to screw with him, his phone buzzed in Christine’s hand. She held the phone out so they both could read the notification.

**NOTIFICATION FROM TWITTER**  
@gaymersmichael: so this might be weird but do you want to hang out tomorrow??

Jeremy didn’t even look up at Christine to see the stupidly smug smirk on her face.

—

Jeremy stuffed his hands in his pockets and then immediately pulled them back out again. His palms were sweaty.

He honestly couldn’t believe that after just one night of talking (and a day of cyberstalking), Michael had actually wanted to meet him in real life. Christine had put a halt to his freakout before it had even fully begun, ordering him to get some sleep and freak out once he woke up.

And now, here he was. He was in a little coffee shop just a few blocks from campus. It was one he and Christine had been to many times, and it felt weird that he was going to meet Michael here, of all places. Almost like a clash of two worlds, though that didn’t make much sense.

Christine had offered many times to come along so Jeremy wouldn’t be so nervous, but Jeremy didn’t want to look like a total dweeb who couldn’t even hang out without his best friend constantly being around. It felt weirdly like taking his mom on a date with him, but he’d never voice that out loud. So he’d said no and, as a compromise, Christine had promised to be ready to swoop in and save him at any point during the day.

“Save me from what?” Jeremy had asked, anxiety creeping into his voice. 

“Yourself, mostly,” Christine had responded, not unkindly. It hadn’t been much comfort.

Jeremy was wearing a black Galaga sweatshirt and already regretting every life choice he’d ever made when the bell on the door chimed and Michael walked in. Instantly, Jeremy felt all the breath leave his lungs. God, he was even cuter in person. He had the same red hoodie on that he wore in almost every video, a black snapback, and white headphones circling his neck. God he looked so… _Michael_. It was like he was trying hard to be “gaymersmichael”, even though he _was_ gaymersmichael.

Jeremy stood from his seat, realizing belatedly that Michael probably wouldn’t recognize him. Jeremy was the one, after all, who’d spent the last three years staring at Michael’s face, not the other way around. He raised a hand awkwardly to get Michael’s attention.

“Uh, Michael, hey,” he stammered. Michael turned and saw him and (somehow) seemed to recognize him. He beamed and made his way over to Jeremy, dodging a table with an old woman reading a romance novel.

“Jeremy, dude, hey!” Jeremy did his best not to yelp (or spontaneously combust) when Michael immediately pulled him into a hug. He hugged him back, possibly too tight, and then stepped back. His face felt like it was on fire. “Ah, sorry about that. It’s just really great to meet you, you know?” 

Jeremy didn’t trust his voice right then, so he just nodded, a smile on his lips. Michael must have sensed that Jeremy was nervous, or even that he was perpetually awkward, because he smiled easily and clapped Jeremy on the shoulder.

“So do you wanna get some coffee? We can walk around- there’s this awesome record shop a few blocks away?”

“Yeah,” Jeremy managed to say, his voice a high-pitched squeak. “That’s sounds great!”

Michael’s grin grew. “Great,” he echoed.

They both bought themselves a coffee (Jeremy a mocha latte and Michael a cappuccino) and started walking. Michael led the way to the record store, which Jeremy had never been before. And slowly, as Michael chattered on about how he’d hated coffee until he moved to New York and Jake had taught him what good coffee tasted like, Jeremy loosened up. He didn’t feel quite so nervous, or at least he was able to push it aside and talk back.

“Ugh I’ve been addicted to coffee since freshman year of high school! Christine got me hooked on McDonald’s frappes and it’s just been downhill since then,” he said, laughing. Michael scrunched his nose (Jeremy almost died from how cute it was- _holy shit_ ).

“Ew, McDonald’s has the worst coffee ever,” he said.

“Okay, I was fourteen,” Jeremy said, “what the fuck did I know?” He felt really pleased when Michael burst into laughter at that. He liked knowing he could make Michael laugh.

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: okay here’s ur 15 min check in… how’s it going???

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: is he being nice??? cause idc if he’s twice my size i’ll kick his butt for u

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: also like can u ask him abt pinkberry for me?? u’d be the best friend ever

Jeremy rolled his eyes and dismissed Christine’s texts. And Michael’s quizzical look, he said, “My best friend, Christine. Just checking in, and being embarrassing.” Jeremy finished off the last of his coffee and threw the cup away in a trashcan they passed by.

“She’s your best friend, it’s kind of her job, isn’t it?” Michael asked. Jeremy groaned a little and nodded.

“I mean, I know I can be annoying, too, so I can’t blame her for it…”

“I don’t think you’re annoying,” Michael said softly. Jeremy blinked and looked at his feet.

“Well, you just met me,” he said lowly. Trying to lighten the mood, he added, “I’m hiding my annoying-ness until it’s too late, anyway. You’ll be stuck with me by then.”

Michael let out a small laugh, which sounded more for Jeremy’s sake than anything, and asked, “So what did Christine say that was so embarrassing?”

Jeremy scratched the back of his neck. “Ah, threatening to beat you up if you’re mean to me. She’s five foot nothing, though, so I wouldn’t be worried if I were you.”

“Good to know.”

“And she wanted me to ask about Pinkberry,” Jeremy added, wincing a little. He hurried to add, “I mean I’m not gonna ‘cause I don’t wanna be weird and I don’t want you to think I just want to talk about Youtube stuff all the time because I really don’t care about it, so just forget I said anything and we can-”

“Jer, hey, calm down,” Michael said gently, grabbing Jeremy’s arm. They slowed to a stop, stepping out of the way of foot traffic. “It’s okay.”

Jeremy knew his face was probably all splotchy and red from embarrassment and he sort of ducked his head a little to not look Michael in the eye.

“You don’t need to get so worked up, okay?” Michael’s hand slid from Jeremy’s elbow until his fingers were playing with Jeremy’s. “I really don’t mind.”

“I just-” Jeremy struggled to find the words to say what his mind was thinking. “I just don’t want you to think that all of _that_ is all I care about, you know? ‘Cause I-I mean, it might just have been me, but this is, like, the quickest I’ve ever connected with someone and I like you for you and I don’t care about-”

Michael cut him off with a soft kiss. He pulled back before Jeremy could gather his senses and do anything but just stand there like an idiot, but somehow he didn’t look upset. Michael had this sort of… dopey look on his face.

“You’re really cute when you babble, did you know that?” Michael asked softly.

“Uh, no?”

“Well, you are. And you don’t need to freak out, seriously. Most of my life is connected to Youtube in some way, so it’s gonna come up more than occasionally. As long as it’s not all we talk about, I’m not gonna think it’s all you care about. You didn’t even mention it once when we talked for, like, eight hours, anyway.”

Michael stepped closer so their chests were practically touching. He was properly holding both of Jeremy’s hands now and Jeremy held on firmly.

“Yeah, I guess,” he mumbled. He looked more at Michael’s red hoodie than anything. “So, um, do you really wear this hoodie all the time?”

Michael laughed and Jeremy finally looked up to meet his gaze. “No. I pretty much only wear it for videos these days.”

“Then why are you wearing it today?” It was Michael’s turn to blush.

“It was just cold,” he mumbled. Jeremy raised his eyebrows.

“And you didn’t have a different jacket you could wear?” 

Still holding Jeremy’s hand, Michael used the back of his hand to push his glasses back up his nose.

“So, what does your friend want to know about Chloe and Brooke?” He asked brightly, not-so-subtly changing the subject. “And, uh, the record shop is right across the street if we wanna go inside.”

Jeremy was a little confused and a lot suspicious about the subject change, but he decided not to pry. They walked across the street and into the small hole-in-the-wall record store, still holding hands. 

Jeremy’s head was spinning. Here he was, holding Michael’s hand and having just kissed the guy! He couldn’t believe this day had gone this way. He’d even had one of his meltdowns and Michael had been totally cool. It was kind of really unbelievable, but somehow totally true.

“I mean, pretty much anything and everything,” Jeremy said once they were inside the warm store. “She’s pretty obsessed with them. Kind of in love with both of them, if you ask me.”

Michael laughed at that. “I mean, who isn’t?”

Jeremy shrugged, sort of agreeing. He supposed all of their fans were in love with at least one of them, if not both.

The record shop was actually really cool. It was a really nerdy place, unlike how most record places Jeremy knew tried so hard to be hipster. There were Marvel posters on the wall, Lord of the Rings bobble heads along the counter of the register. Jeremy even swore he heard the Phantom of the Opera playing softly over the speakers, but he didn’t know the show well enough to be certain. He’d definitely have to remember to show Christine this place.

“You can go ahead and ask, you know,” Michael said after a quiet moment as Jeremy took the store in. Michael was sifting through a section of vinyl entitled “90s classics”, as if that were a normal category.

“Ask what?” Jeremy asked, half-forgetting what they were even talking about. Michael squeezed his hand lightly.

“They are dating,” Michael responded as if Jeremy had asked. “You gotta keep it a secret, though. Brooke’s not out to her family yet.”

Jeremy looked over at Michael, surprised he would reveal something like that to someone he’d only met recently. Michael just gave a sort of half shrug and kept looking until he pulled out a Whitney Houston album.

“Whoa,” he breathed, eyes wide. “I’ve been looking for this for, like, forever!”

And just like that, the subject was dropped and they moved on. Michael was, to put it kindly, appalled when Jeremy confessed to having never listened to a record in his life (“It’s the best way to listen to music!”) and quickly made a date for Jeremy to come to his place and listen to music.

Jeremy could already _hear_ Christine freaking out on his behalf.

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: uh, i really hope ur just having fun and not dead in a gutter somewhere jer

“Ah, shit,” Jeremy mumbled, thumbing out a quick reply letting Christine know he was, in fact, still alive, and that he’d talk to her later. Michael looked over at him, one eyebrow raised. “I forgot to text Christine back, it’s fine. She just worries.”

“That’s cute,” Michael said, sounding genuinely like he meant it. Jeremy ran his hand through his hair, shaking his head.

“So, uh, how do you do that eyebrow thing?” Jeremy asked a little awkwardly. 

“What eyebrow thing?” Michael asked teasingly. He raised his eyebrow up and down a few times. “You mean this?”

Jeremy giggled and nodded. 

Michael made a regal face and said in the most serious tone he could, “It’s just talent, baby.”

The two dissolved into laughter, holding onto each other to keep standing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this certainly went in a different direction than I was planning, but I like how it turned out. Hope you guys enjoyed!!


	5. The Best Day

Christine looked like she was about to cry. Or pass out. Or both. Jeremy had gone straight to her dorm room after he and Michael had gone their separate ways hours later. They were sitting on her bed, facing each other with their legs crossed. 

“Um, Chris?” Jeremy said carefully, leaning forward a little. He was prepared to grab her if she passed out, preventing her from hitting her head on the cinderblock walls of the dorm. “You okay?”

“This is real life,” she whispered. She lifted a shaky hand to her hair and pulled, checking to see if she was dreaming. “Oh my god.”

Jeremy just sat there, poised but patient, as she processed the news. It was sort of her dream coming true, so Jeremy did his best to be understanding.

Jeremy had barely managed to remember to ask Michael if it was okay to tell Christine about Brooke and Chloe dating in real life, and thankfully Michael had said as long as she kept it to herself then it would be fine. Jeremy really hoped she would, but the elation and excitement on her face worried him just a little. Plus, Christine wasn’t the best secret-keeper in the world.

“You can’t tell anyone,” he reminded her gently, finally pulling her attention back to him. Slowly a grin grew over Christine’s lips and she launched herself at him, hugging him so tight that the breath was knocked out of him.

“THIS IS THE BEST DAY EVER!” She squealed, clinging to Jeremy like a koala. She was shaking, she was so excited.

“Whoa, are you two finally hooking up? ‘Cause I’ll leave.” Jeremy and Christine both made a face and turned to glare at Christine’s roommate, Jenna. She stood in the doorway, sipping on a coffee from Starbucks. She didn’t even truly look phased.

“Ew,” both of them said in unison. Jenna held up her free hand in surrender.

“Hey, I just call ‘em like I see ‘em,” she said, walking over to drop her purse on her bed. Christine pushed herself off of Jeremy. She shook her head, waving a finger in Jenna’s direction.

“That’s never gonna happen, Jen,” she said firmly. A sly look appeared on her face and she glanced at Jeremy. “Besides, Jeremy’s got himself a boyfriend.”

Jenna looked between the two of them disbelievingly. Jeremy’s face heated up.

“We went on one date,” he was quick to say, “that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s my _boyfriend_ \- I mean he’s really cute and nice and perfect in like every way and doesn’t even mind when I start to babble but-”

“You mean like you are now?” Jenna asked, raising her eyebrows. Jeremy flushed deeper and shut his mouth. He knew his babbling was annoying to most people, but he just couldn’t help it! When he got flustered, he had a tendency to word vomit.

Christine breathed sharply out of her nose. “That’s not nice, Jenna.”

Jeremy shook his head. “It’s not a big deal.” He and Jenna weren’t exactly friends. She didn’t intend to be mean to him, but they were just so different that social interaction between them never really worked out well.

“So what were you so giddy about, anyway? If you guys aren’t actually hooking up, which I’m not totally convinced about yet.” Jenna asked before Christine could begin her lecture. If it had been about any other topic in the world, Christine could have barreled on and scolded her roommate for being mean to Jeremy and how Jenna could at least keep her comments to herself while Jeremy was present… But the question reminded her that Pinkberry was in love _in real life_ and not just in her fantasies and, well, she sort of got a dopey look on her face. 

“Oh, you’ll never guess!” Christine exclaimed, bouncing out of the bed to grab Jenna’s hands. She jumped in place, practically vibrating out of her skin with happiness. Jeremy tensed, not knowing how to stop Christine before she spilled this secret to the biggest gossip he knew. There was a part of him that thought he should have kept Inkberry’s relationship a secret, but another part reminded him that Christine was his best friend and if anyone deserved to know, it was her. 

Christine was about to speak, but stopped herself. She slowed her jumping until she was just standing, though she was still shaking with excitement.

“Well?” Jenna looked impatient, ready for the gossip.

“I got the part!” Christine blurted out. She looked surprised for a moment, but rolled with it. “I’m gonna be Natalie in the school’s production of Next to Normal!” She jumped again, spazzing just a little.

“What, really?” Jeremy asked, leaning forward on the bed. Christine nodded.

“I thought you knew?” Jenna asked, looking between the two of them. “And I mean, congrats Chris, but I thought it was gonna be a little more exciting than just that.”

Christine waved a hand. “Oh, boo on you, then. C’mon Jer, let’s go get food. I’m dying for pizza.” Never mind that they’d just had pizza the other day or anything.

Jeremy barely had time to grab his phone before Christine pulled him out the door and into the hallway.

“Did you really get the part?” He asked as soon as she released her death grip on his arm.

Christine nodded. “I did! I was gonna tell you but then you told me the- _you know_ \- news and I got distracted. God, today’s just the best day ever, isn’t it?”

Jeremy hugged her. “I told you that you’d get it! I’m so proud of you, Christine. I know that’s one of your dream roles.”

“I know, I can’t believe it,” Christine breathed. “I really thought Madeleine Garcia was gonna get it- you should have heard her audition! I would kill to be able to sing like she does.”

“You’re singing is obviously better, since you got the part,” Jeremy pointed out. “And thanks, for not saying anything about- what I know you really wanted to say.”

Christine nodded, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Yeah, I’ll really have to watch myself for a while, make sure I don’t slip. I don’t want to ruin things for anyone. God, I wouldn’t want to accidentally out Brooke before she’s ready! And then Michael would be upset with you for telling me and Brooke would upset with Michael for telling you and-”

“I’m supposed to be the rambler in this friendship,” Jeremy said gently, cutting her off before she devolved into an anxious mess. Jeremy knew the feeling pretty well.

“It’s just a lot, and I’m not very good at keeping secrets,” Christine said, looking down at her feet. The two of them stepped out of the way so someone could walk past.

“I know that, but you can do it when it’s something important. Remember junior year when I accidentally spiked the beaker for the play?” Ugh. Jeremy had let some bully named Eric convince him that the only way he would ever be cool was if he followed everything the guy had said. Eric had told Jeremy that he needed to prove he trusted Eric by putting sugar pills in the beaker that was being used for the love potion. Jeremy had stupidly done so, not knowing they were really ecstasy pills. Christine was the only person who knew that Jeremy had done it, not Eric, but she’d never told anyone.

“That was different.” Jeremy shrugged.

“Not really. You can do it. I know, or else I wouldn’t have told you,” he lied. He honestly had no idea if she could keep it to herself, but he wanted to believe she could rise to the occasion. He hit her softly on the shoulder. “Hey, you wanna bring the pizza back to my room and you can update your Pinkberry fic? I’ll even read it over for you.”

Christine’s eyes lit up. “I actually have the _best_ idea for a new one!”

“Uh, okay, but you gotta finish the one you’re writing first.”

“But-”

“No.”

“Jeremy!”

“Nope.”

“I can do what I want, it’s my fic.”

“Yeah, I think I’m gonna veto you on that.” They began walking, finally, to go get their food. The two of them bickered back and forth the entire way to Dominos and then even more on the way to Jeremy’s dorm room.

—

 **NEW MESSAGE**  
Michael: yeah, if you wanna be here by like 5 that’d be good

Jeremy was a nervous wreck, but what else was new? Freaking out over Michael should have been old hat by now, but here he was. Freaking out, yet again.

Christine was at rehearsal, or else Jeremy would have dragged her along with him, no matter how pathetic that made him look. She’d given him some words of encouragement before she’d gone, but he could hardly remember what they were now.

Michael had invited Jeremy to his apartment, where they would hang out with his best friends, Rich and Jake. If Jeremy thought going on a sort-of date with Michael had been stressful, hanging out with three people that he pretty much just knew from videos seems catastrophic.

He felt weird without Christine, though he should be used to this by now. Christine loved doing musicals, but Jeremy was so bad at singing and had absolutely no rhythm with which he could dance, so he was never casted in them. But still, he missed her already. Plus, he really needed someone to talk to.

Normally, if he didn’t have anyone to vent to, he would just live tweet his meltdown and then delete all of them later, but he was keenly aware that Michael followed him on Twitter now and Jeremy really didn’t want to seem like a total loser to Michael quite yet.

Jeremy looked in the bathroom mirror, tugging his striped shirt down a little bit. He had his favorite blue cardigan on over it (it was the fuzziest and therefore the best). His hair was fluffy and curly, but he didn’t know how to mess with it to make it look better so he left it alone for fear of making it worse.

He sighed deeply. He didn’t look very cool, but Michael didn’t mind, did he? He’d seemed to like how Jeremy looked, even if it was kind of dorky.

Almost on cue, Jeremy’s phone buzzed.

 **NEW MESSAGE**  
Michael: don’t freak out, okay? 

**Michael** : we’re just gonna be hanging out

 **Michael** : it’ll be fun

 **Me** : how’d u kno i was freaking out?

 **Michael** : idk it just seemed like you would

 **Me** : idk whether to be offended or happy that u kno me so well already

Jeremy felt better already. He had a stupid little grin on his face as he stood in front of the sink.

 **Michael** : if you wanna come a little earlier you can

 **Michael** : before rich and jake get here

 **Me** : is it ok if i come now?

—

Going to Michael’s before his friends arrived did, in fact, help some with Jeremy’s nerves, but not a whole lot. There was still a lot of pressure to be in Michael’s apartment, alone, with him. Jeremy felt like a bundle of nerves.

“Hey, dude!” Jeremy was pulled into a hug by Michael before he could chicken out and run back down the stairs.

“Hey,” Jeremy mumbled, hugging Michael back tightly. Michael stepped back to let him into the apartment and shut the door behind them.

Michael’s apartment felt surprisingly familiar, mostly thanks to all the vlogs Jeremy had watched that took place right in there. He hadn’t expected for it to feel so homey, though. It was really nice. It was bright and open, with (weirdly nice) bean bags in front of the couch and bookshelves stuffed with DVDs, video games, graphic novels, and more.

“This is even nicer in person,” Jeremy said without thinking. Immediately, he blushed and slapped his hands over his mouth. He looked over at Michael, “I mean- That came out weird-”

Michael shook his head. “You really need to calm down, Jer. It’s cool. You want something to drink?”

Things eased up a bit after Michael grabbed them both Cokes and sat Jeremy down on the couch. It was more comfortable than it looked and it had Jeremy sinking in between the cushions. Michael sat next to him, leaving some space between the two of them but was close enough that he kept bumping Jeremy’s knee with his own.

Michael had this way of calming Jeremy down without really even trying. Jeremy had never experienced anything like it. Even Christine, the person Jeremy was closest to in the entire world, had to put time and effort into keeping Jeremy calm when he was stressed. She didn’t even always know what to do, though Jeremy never blamed her for that (he knew he was a handful, much as he hated it). But Michael could just start talking about whatever was on his mind (like right now he was recounting the time he had to re-film an entire video because during editing he’d realized that Rich was drunkenly dancing in the background the entire time) and Jeremy just felt all of his nerves and tension melt away.

“It couldn’t have been that bad,” Jeremy insisted, bumping Michael’s knee.

Michael raised his eyebrow, “You wanna bet?”

“What kind of bet?” Michael shot him a wicked grin.

“I guess you’ll just have to take it and find out.”

It kind of made Jeremy nervous, but the look in Michael’s eyes excited him, so he agreed. Michael laughed and grabbed his laptop.

“Here, scoot over,” Michael said, placing a hand on Jeremy’s thigh and pulling lightly. Blushing, Jeremy complied and scooted until their legs were pressing against each other. Michael placed the laptop so it was half on his lap and half on Jeremy’s and pulled up a video file. He clicked on it.

“Hey, guys!” Michael said from the video. It was a little weird to be watching a gaymers video with Michael sitting right there, but Jeremy did his best to focus on the video and _not_ on the cute boy pressed against him. It was quite hard, actually (there’s a joke right there, but Jeremy pushed it from his mind to prevent a real problem from emerging).

And, so it was, Rich was standing just behind Michael in the video. He was drunkenly dancing, swirling his hips in a way that was probably supposed to be sexy, but really just looked humorous. Jeremy couldn’t help himself; he burst out into laughter. Rich was _so_ clearly wasted and he was eyeing the camera as if he was about to ask it on a date. And he was right behind Michael, not even in the background.

“How did you not know he was there?” Jeremy asked between laughs. He could hardly focus on Michael in the clip with Rich back there, seducing the camera with everything he had.

“I don’t know,” Michael sighed. “I felt so dumb when I went to edit this.”

Jeremy couldn’t even say anything; he was laughing too hard. He leaned against Michael, half-burying his face into Michael’s shoulder while still watching the video.

“Oh no,” a voice came from behind them, causing both boys to jump in their seats. Jeremy instinctively grabbed the laptop to prevent it from falling. “Why are you showing him that video? God, that’s so embarrassing.”

Rich and Jake had come into the apartment without Jeremy or Michael even realizing. Jeremy’s first though was that Rich was shorter than he’d thought. Jake was also pretty tall, though, so maybe that had something to do with it.

“Uh, hi,” Jeremy said awkwardly. He gave a little wave.

“Yeah, guys, this is Jeremy. Jeremy, Rich and Jake.” Michael did the introductions, though Jeremy noticed him blushing a little bit. Which was weird, he couldn’t help but think.

“Hey, man, good to meet you,” Jake said, slapping Jeremy on the shoulder. Jeremy smiled and nodded in reply, trying to ignore how his shoulder stung. He was kind of a weak guy, and Jake most certainly was not.

A slow smile spread across Rich’s lips. It looked almost… sharklike in a way that put Jeremy on edge. “Oh, _you’re_ Jeremy! Nice to meet you man, I just know we’ll be good friends.”

“Uh, cool,” Jeremy said, not understanding why Michael turned sharply to glare at Rich.

“Dude,” Michael said, forcing a smile at Rich. “Why don’t we play a video game or something? 

“Yeah,” Rich continued as if he hadn’t heard Michael. He made his way around the couch and plopped down next to Jeremy. Jake went the other way, sitting on one of the beanbag chairs. “I mean, we’ve talked so much as it is, so obviously we’ll be friends in real life, too!”

“How does Mario Kart sound?” Michael asked loudly, jumping to his feet. “I literally can’t think of any other four person games right now, so how about it?”

“Uh, Mario Kart is cool with me,” Jeremy said. He turned to Rich, thoroughly confused. “What do you mean? No offense, but we’ve never spoken before.”

“So I usually like to be Bowser-” Michael barreled on as he plugged in the Wii.

Rich blinked, feigning confusion. “What do you mean? I’ve co-written every text Michael has sent you, so obviously we’ve talked.”

“OKAY!” Michael forcibly sat between Rich and Jeremy, throwing everyone their controllers. “So I’m gonna be Bowser, Jake likes being Luigi, Jeremy which character do you want to be?” Michael turned so Rich was hidden behind his back, looking expectantly at Jeremy.

“Uh, I guess Mario?” Jeremy said, feeling incredibly flustered. Michael had Rich help him text Jeremy? _Every_ text?

The thought that Michael cared that much made Jeremy smile to himself.

Jeremy heard Rich snickering to himself as the game started up. He glanced over at Michael and saw that his cheeks were flaming red and he didn’t look very happy. Jeremy found that he didn’t like it that Michael was unhappy, even if it was cute that he was embarrassed.

They played the game and the tension ebbed away. Everyone seemed to be quite shocked to find out that Jeremy was very competitive and shouted a lot when he played video games.

“You’re, like, so… quiet, though,” Jake marveled when Jeremy cursed out the computer-player Peach for being ‘a little bitch’ and sending a red shell at him. Jeremy sat back in the couch and shrugged, half-embarrassed but half not.

“I’m not that quiet,” he said. “Besides, Peach is always a bitch. That’s why I make Christine play her when she plays with me.”

“No, but then you end up with Daisy, and she’s no better,” Rich argued.

“Daisy is so better than Peach!” Jeremy cried. In his distraction, he went right off the edge in Rainbow Road and groaned. “Thanks, Rich.”

“No problem, man,” Rich said brightly, moving up to second place once Jeremy was out of the running.

Jeremy shouldn’t have been so nervous. Rich and Jake were fun to be around and not quite as cool as they seemed online, which was good for Jeremy. Halfway through their second round of Mario Kart and Jeremy actually sort of felt like they were his friends, too, which was strange in the best way possible. He’d thought it would be weird and awkward to be around Michael’s friends instead of it just being the two of them, but it turned out to be really fun.

By the time Jeremy had to get going, he was actually sad to go. He texted Christine to ask about her first rehearsal and to let her know he was on his way back to campus. Michael walked him downstairs, leaving both Rich and Jake in the apartment. Jeremy thought he heard a wolf whistle, but he ignored it.

“Sorry about them,” Michael said as they walked down the steps. 

“Don’t be, they’re actually pretty great,” Jeremy said quickly.

“Why are you so surprised?” Michael asked teasingly. Jeremy flushed.

“I’m just not always good around new people and I was afraid they wouldn’t like me ‘cause they’re your friends and I really like you and-”

“I was kidding,” Michael said affectionately. He cupped Jeremy’s cheek lightly. “Is it okay if I kiss you?” Wordlessly, Jeremy nodded and Michael kissed him lightly on the lips. Jeremy wanted to stay right there forever, but after a minute his phone buzzed in his pocket, effectively ruining the moment.

 **NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: i’ll tell u all about it when u get here!!! (i’m in ur room already dw)

Jeremy didn’t bother to wonder how Christine had gotten into his room when he had the only key. He just shoved the phone back in his pocket.

“Sorry about that,” he said.

“That reminds me,” Michael said. He hesitated. “About what Rich said- earlier, I mean…” He trailed off, but Jeremy knew what he was talking about.

“You don’t have to be embarrassed,” Jeremy said. “It’s cute that you had Rich help you text me.”

“Ugh, that sounds so lame when you say it out loud,” Michael groaned, tipping his head back. “I mean, not that it wasn’t lame when I was calling him asking what I should say, but you know.”

Jeremy licked his lips before saying, “Yeah. I kinda did the same thing with Christine for the first few messages. So, you know, samesies?”

Jeremy inwardly cringed at his use of the word “samesies”. Michael didn’t bat an eye, though. He just chuckled and said, “Okay, but that still makes me more pathetic than you. I made Rich stay up with me _all_ night that first day while we talked.”

Jeremy opened his mouth to disagree, but shut it again. Michael just laughed. “Yeah, sorry, I can’t argue with that.”

“I know, I’m lame. Sue me.”

Jeremy hesitated, then said, “I’d rather kiss you instead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to state that I don't actually condone shipping real people and writing fics about them, but... I couldn't _not_ do this with Pinkberry :p


	6. Street Festival

Jeremy was head over heels in the best way possible. He and Michael had been hanging out and even going on official dates for the past few weeks and, to be quite honest, it had been the best few weeks of Jeremy’s young life. He couldn’t imagine anything better. Well, maybe that wasn’t quite true.

He felt like he hadn’t seen Christine in weeks. What with her rehearsals for Next to Normal and him spending so much time hanging out with Michael (and, often, Rich and Jake), they didn’t really see each other except for when they were in class. And they couldn’t really talk while in a lecture hall.

So, being the best friends that they are, they found a way.

“This weekend,” Christine had said as they walked out of Greek History, “is just for you and me, you got that? We have a break from rehearsals, so I’m completely free. I expect you to be, as well.” She’d stepped in front of Jeremy, staring up at him and pointing her finger in front of his face. She was doing all she could to scream ‘I mean business!’ without actually screaming in the middle of the building.

And of course, Jeremy had agreed. He really missed Christine, so why wouldn’t he?

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Michael: so a bunch of us were gonna go to this street festival downtown on sat, do you wanna come?

Oh. Right.

Was he a bad person for wanting to hang out with Michael so much? Was it just completely awful of him to want to spend time with Michael, even if that meant blowing off Christine? He could answer that for himself. Yes, yes it did make him a terrible human being.

He knew the right thing to do would be to say ‘sorry, i have plans’ or ‘maybe another time’. He should explain that he’d promised his weekend to Christine. Michael would understand; Jeremy knew that. He was a great guy, of course he would get it.

**Me** : sure, that sounds like fun!!

What the fuck was wrong with him?

**Michael** : awesome! i can pick you up around noon, if that’s cool?

No. No, it most certainly _wasn’t_ cool! Jeremy needed to be a good friend and say something like ‘oops sorry’ and be done with it. 

**Me** : yeah that works

Jeremy threw his phone on the floor before he could damn himself further. He flopped back on his bed and groaned loudly. It was like his brain knew what he _should_ do, but his body had other plans and was working solo. Or maybe, Jeremy was just a sucky friend and he didn’t want to take responsibility for it.

Jeremy laid there for a bit, wildly constructing scenarios where he somehow managed to be in two places at once and got away with it without Christine ever realizing. His phone buzzed from the floor. Groaning again, he slid off the bed and sat on the floor, grabbing his phone.

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Christine: leaving the theatre now!! i’m all urs for the weekend!!!!!

Jeremy was such a bad person.

He felt even worse when Christine showed up, all bubbly and full of smiles.

“Jeremy!” She cried, throwing herself at him for a hug. He caught her, but stumbled back a bit. “Oh my god, I feel like I haven’t see you in forever!”

“We just saw each other in class today, Chris,” Jeremy said weakly. Christine stepped back, adjusting her shirt (yes, it was finally cold enough outside that Christine had retired her casual dresses until spring). She clapped her hands.

“That doesn’t count, and you know it,” she said. “But anyway, I’m starving! Do you wanna go get dinner and then we can watch some movies.” She gasped lightly and grabbed Jeremy’s arm. “Coco is out on DVD, right? We should totally watch that and cry, it’ll be so much fun!”

And so, there night began with a visit to Target to buy Coco and then a trip to the dining hall. Christine was determined to eat her weight in macaroni and literally came back to the table with three bowls of it in one trip. Jeremy got a salad and did his best to eat it all, but his stomach felt like it was in knots.

“You okay, Jer?” Christine asked, halfway through her second bowl of macaroni and cheese. Jeremy was fruitlessly stabbing a cherry tomato with his fork. “You seem out of it.”

Jeremy was silent. He knew this was his chance to come clean to Christine, since obviously he wasn’t going to do that with Michael. The thought made him feel even worse about himself. He looked up at Christine and his heart hurt. She looked so sweet and concerned, her eyes wide and earnest. Ugh, she deserved a better best friend than Jeremy.

“I just- screwed up?” Jeremy said uncertainly. Christine furrowed her eyebrows.

“What do you mean?”

“I-” Jeremy’s shoulders slumped. He buried his face in his hands. “I suck.”

“Jeremy Heere, you listen to me right now,” Christine said sternly, leaning over her mac and cheese. “You most certainly do not suck, and I won’t stand for you to say something like that.”

Christine was a much better friend than he was.

“I told Michael I’d go with him and his friends to some festival downtown on Saturday,” Jeremy blurted out. Immediately, he stared down his salad to avoid having to look Christine in the eyes. “I’m sorry, I’m so stupid- I don’t know what came over me and I just said yes even though I knew I shouldn’t’ve and I feel awful-”

“Jeremy!” Christine grabbed Jeremy’s hand, startling him into looking up at her. To his amazement, she didn’t look all that upset. Mildly disappointed, maybe (and he felt terrible about that), but not anywhere near what he was fearing. “You need to calm down, okay? Breathe.”

Obediently, Jeremy took a deep breath and released it, but he didn’t feel any better.

“Look, I get it,” Christine said kindly. “He’s your boyfriend and you wanna spend as much time with him as possible. I-I understand that I need to learn how to share you. I’m so used to being the only person who you hang out with.” She gave a small laugh, but it was anything but funny.

Jeremy didn’t point out that he and Michael weren’t official yet. He just squirmed in his seat.

“I still want to hang out with you,” he said quickly. “I swear! I just- just-” He floundered, not knowing how to explain how Michael made the rest of the world disappear, how he was afraid of ever disappointing him, how he was just so _desperate_ for anything Michael was willing to give him that he didn’t think things through. None of it was coming out in coherent words and his mouth just seemed caught on the word ‘just’.

“I was being selfish, too,” Christine said, interrupting him. She squeezed his wrist lightly. “I shouldn’t have asked for the whole weekend. That wasn’t fair of me.”

Jeremy groaned, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his free hand. “Please don’t try to take the blame for my stupidity.”

Christine laughed again, and this time it sounded more genuine. “I’m not. Trust me, I won’t take the blame completely off you.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” she said primly. She looked down at her mac and cheese and grimaced. “I think I took too much food. Do you want some?”

Yeah, they were gonna be fine.

—

**NEW MESSAGE**  
Michael: hey, you should see if christine wants to come

**Me** : tomorrow?

**Michael** : yeah!! i uh might have a surprise for her

**Me** : ???? gimme a sec, i’ll ask

“Hey, Chris?” Jeremy and Christine were hanging out in Jeremy’s room, as per usual. It was late Friday night. Jeremy was doing his best to spend as much time with Christine as possible to make up for the fact that he was skipping out on her tomorrow. That included staying up far later than he normally did just to soak up as much best-friend-time as possible.

“Yeah?” Christine didn’t look up from her laptop. She was typing furiously, like she only ever did late at night when she wrote her Pinkberry fics.

“Do you wanna come to the street festival tomorrow?” That gave Christine pause. Her fingers stopped moving and she looked up at him in surprise. 

“You want me to come?” God, Jeremy must really be a sucky best friend if she was _that_ surprised about the invitation. He nodded emphatically to make up for his own personal suckiness. “I don’t know, Jeremy. Michael and all of them probably wouldn’t want me there.”

“Hey,” Jeremy said quickly, turning to face her head on. “They may not know it yet, but you’re one of the coolest people ever and they’ll be lucky to spend any time with you. Besides, Michael said he had a surprise for you, but I can just tell him not to worry about it…” Jeremy waved his phone in the air before pretending to text Michael.

“Fine! Fine, I’ll go,” she said, feigning like it was some huge concession on her part to attend. She tucked her short hair behind her ear. “You know, for Michael.”

“For Michael,” Jeremy echoed, as if it were a logical notion.

The continued smoothly. Jeremy read over and approved the new chapter to Christine’s fic and she posted it online. They watched a few Youtube videos together (Jeremy sat through Chloe doing a makeup tutorial and Christine sat through yet another AotD walkthrough video), and finally passed out.

Jeremy woke the next morning with nerves dancing inside his belly, like he always did when he knew he was going to see Michael. Normally, though, Christine could wash away his nerves and calm him down. This particular Saturday wasn’t quite so normal, though.

“Who all’s going to be there?” She worried, tugging down her bright green dress so it hung right off her hips. “What if they hate me and then we all just have to be there with them hating me all day? Ugh, this dress is so weird-looking, why did I think it was pretty?”

“Christine!” Jeremy grabbed Christine by the elbows so she was forced to look into his eyes. “Breathe. They’re not gonna hate you. Somehow, they don’t hate me, so there’s no way they could hate you. And your dress is pretty, so stop freaking out.” Her dress really wasn’t all that pretty (it was lime green), but Jeremy would die swearing it was if that was what she needed.

Christine took a deep breath. “You’re right. Of course you’re right. I shouldn’t freak out. I’m totally not freaking out. Totally normal, that’s me.”

“And if it gets awkward you can just start singing,” Jeremy suggested. “Wow them with your performance of ‘Superboy and the Invisible Girl’.” 

Christine whacked him on the arm, but she looked considerably calmer.

Keeping Christine calm had the remarkable side effect of keeping Jeremy calm, so he wasn’t even freaking out as he got ready. He didn’t even stare down the clock until it finally ( _finally_ ) hit noon and they headed to the front lounge to see if Michael had arrived.

—

Christine might have clicked with Michael’s friends better than Jeremy had. The street festival was packed, bustling with people. Rich and Jake seemed to adore Christine and she seemed right at home with them, chatting away like Jeremy had never seen. He was almost jealous, but then Michael slipped his hand inside Jeremy’s and the feeling melted away.

“Thanks,” Jeremy said lowly, watching how much fun Christine seemed to be having, “for letting me invite her.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Michael asked, bumping his shoulder against Jeremy’s. “She’s your friend. You know all of mine, so it’s only fair I get to know yours.” Jeremy let out a small laugh.

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Plus,” Michael said, “I’ve been wanting to witness this since our first date.”

Jeremy’s eyebrows knit together and he looked over at Michael, confused. Michael just gave him a knowing smile.

“Hey, guys!” Jake called. There was a group of girls sitting at a fold-up table on the edge of the street, a large plate of nachos in the center that they seemed to be sharing. “Christine, you wanna meet our friends?”

“Sure! Hi, I’m-” Christine realized just as Jeremy did.

Chloe Valentine and Brooke Lohst were sitting right there, three feet in front of Christine.

“Christine,” Rich supplied helpfully. He gave Christine a gentle nudge forward, but she didn’t move.

Jeremy looked over to Michael, awed. Michael just smiled smugly back.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Jeremy said.

The dam broke. Christine started talking a mile a minute, asking for hugs from both of the girls. “I’m such a huge fan, oh my god.” Christine whirled around. “Jeremy! Are you seeing this?”

“Yeah, Chris, you wanna get some pictures?” Jeremy asked, phone already in hand. Christine looked like she was on the verge of tears and about to pass out.

“If that’s okay,” she said shyly. “I don’t wanna be weird.”

“Oh, you’re not weird,” Brooke said easily. She stood up and slung an arm around Christine, hugging her. Jeremy snapped the picture. Chloe joined in on the hug, looking amused.

“Aw, look, you finally have a friend your own size,” Chloe said, patting Christine on the head. Brooke and Christine squawked indignantly.

“What about me?” Rich cried, looking offended. Chloe rolled her eyes.

“You’re at least two inches taller than them, you don’t count,” she explained.

“That is discrimination!” 

They devolved into a group of shouts and playful shoves, Michael and Jeremy standing on the outside, watching.

“We have some weird friends,” Michael commented lightly. Jeremy smiled.

“Yeah, I guess we do.”

They split off from the group, walking hand-in-hand through the festival.

“That was really nice,” Jeremy said, squeezing Michael’s hand. Michael squeezed back.

“Yeah, well, they were in town and I figured I should be a good boyfriend, and if that means helping your friend meet her idols, then so be it.”

Jeremy blinked and, after a moment, he broke out into a huge grin. Without thinking, he stopped and pulled Michael in for a kiss. When he stepped back, holding both of Michael’s hands, Michael had a dopey grin on his face.

“What was that for?” He asked.

“You’re my boyfriend,” Jeremy said gleefully. Michael blushed and looked down.

“I mean, I know I didn’t ask, but I figured-”

“Hey, you said it! No take backs,” Jeremy said. Michael rolled his eyes.

“I wasn't gonna-" Jeremy just raised his eyebrows and Michael sighed, smiling. "Fine, no take backs."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is short and sucky and I'm sorry :p but thank you all for all of your incredibly nice comments about this story!! They truly make my day.


	7. Epilogue- The Boyfriend Tag

“Come on, Jer, it’ll be fun!” Michael whined, throwing himself across the couch and Jeremy’s lap. Instinctively, Jeremy’s hands buried themselves in Michael’s hair, pushing his snapback to the floor. Jeremy shook his head at his boyfriend. Michael pouted. “Please? For me?”

Jeremy groaned, tipping his head back. Michael knew Jeremy could never say no to him, and he was definitely not afraid to take advantage of that at times.

They’d been dating for almost a year now, believe it or not. Jeremy sure couldn’t. Every time he saw Michael, held his hand, kissed him, Jeremy couldn’t help but wonder how on Earth he got so lucky.

“Fine,” Jeremy said. “But you owe me!” Michael cheered, springing off of Jeremy’s lap and running to go grab his camera.

Michael and Jeremy had been dating for almost a year, and Jeremy had never been in one of Michael’s Youtube videos. Michael had asked, especially when it came to his daily vlogs, but Jeremy just wasn’t comfortable being in front of a camera. He knew he was an awkward person (it was a damn miracle that Michael somehow thought his awkwardness was endearing) and he knew that wouldn’t translate well on camera.

But now, _now_ Michael really wanted this. And Jeremy was wrapped around Michael’s finger. So, this was happening.

He knew he was going to regret it. But hopefully, one video would prove to Michael that Jeremy just wasn’t made for Youtube (he could barely manage his own blog for goodness’ sake) and that would be the end of it.

Michael was setting up his camera on his tripod, running back and forth to make sure the frame was just right. Jeremy sat up straighter, already feeling self conscious even though the camera wasn’t even recording yet. He looked down and saw Michael’s hat by his ankle.

“So, do you wanna go over the answers first or just do it on the fly?” Michael asked as he pulled out his set of lights from the front closet. The amount of effort Michael put into his videos would have astounded Jeremy right then if he hadn’t sat and watched Michael film already. Still, it was impressive. Two professional-grade lights, a high quality camera on a brand-new tripod, and a microphone built specifically to remove background noise. “I mean, it would be more natural to just come up with the answers as we go along, but I think you’d feel more comfortable if you know what we’re gonna say beforehand.”

Jeremy picked up Michael’s hat and placed it backwards on his head as he answered. “We can try just answering as we go if you want.” He sounded a lot more confident than he felt.

Michael glanced back at him. “You sure about that, I mean-” He broke off suddenly, staring. Jeremy felt himself flush a little, though by now he was used to Michael staring at him. (“You’re just so cute, I can’t help it!”)

“What?”

Michael’s cheeks were a little red as he shook his head and finished setting up the lights. “Nothing! You just look cute, that’s all.” Jeremy grimaced.

“I look stupid, don’t I?” He asked.

“No!” Michael insisted quickly. “I swear I wouldn’t let you look stupid on camera. You look cute.” Jeremy pushed the hat off his head and fluffed his hair a little.

“Jer,” Michael whined. He walked around the coffee table, picked up the hat, and placed it back on Jeremy’s head. Jeremy looked him right in the eyes and knocked it off. Michael let out an indignant squawk and grabbed the hat. He sat next to Jeremy on the couch and shoved the hat back on his head.

“Nope!” Jeremy pushed the hat off his head again. Michael tackled him, knocking both of them so they were laying on the couch, Michael on top. He started tickling Jeremy’s sides. Jeremy squirmed, laughing.

“Mi-Mi-Michael!” Jeremy gasped, grabbing onto Michael’s hoodie as he laughed.

“Admit you look cute in the hat!” Michael cried, smiling down on Jeremy. Jeremy’s face was red with laughter as he wiggled under Michael’s fingers.

“Never!” 

“Say it!” Michael’s head dropped lower, closer to Jeremy’s.

“No-o-ope!”

“Say it.” His fingers slowed to a stop, and instead Michael held onto Jeremy’s hips gently. Jeremy’s laughter died down, though his blush remained. Silently, he shook his head.

Michael’s head dropped the rest of the way, his lips pressing onto Jeremy’s. Jeremy pushed his head up a little and tightened his grip on the sleeves of Michael’s hoodie, pulling Michael as close as he could.

They stayed like that, kissing each other over and over, for a few minutes before Michael sat back, panting.

“Shit,” he said, looking over at the camera. “I’ll edit that out, don’t worry.”

Jeremy sprang up, cheeks flaming. “It’s recording?!”

Michael cupped his hand around Jeremy’s cheek and gave him a soft peck. “Don’t worry, I’ll delete it. Now, you ready?”

Jeremy sighed dramatically, but swung his feet around so he was sitting normally on the couch. “I suppose.”

“You suppose?” Michael repeated, laughing.

“I suppose,” Jeremy said, smile evident in his voice. He rolled his eyes at Michael and picked up the hat, placing it on his head head again. “You win, let’s do this.”

Michael whooped a little before grabbing Jeremy’s hand. “Don’t be nervous, okay? I can edit the shit out of this so-”

“Don’t worry if I say something stupid?” Jeremy quipped. Michael made a face. 

“Nothing you say could be stupid, Jer,” he said, squeezing Jeremy’s hand.

“Yeah, sure.” Jeremy replied lightly. “Just so long as you edit it all out.”

Michael looked like he wanted to argue, but dropped it and turned to face the camera. Jeremy did his best to mimic him. Michael had done a good job distracting him for a moment, but he was nervous again. He looked at the camera and thought of how at least two million people were going to watch this video. Jeremy tried to smile, but it was like he forgot how.

Michael squeezed his hand again. “Jer, you okay?”

Jeremy took a deep breath and nodded. Now or never. “Yeah.”

Michael smiled and began the video, his personality flipping like a switch to the amped up version he used for videos. “Hey, guys! Welcome back to my channel- or welcome, if you’re new, I guess. Today we’re doing a really special video with Jeremy here.” Michael waved their joined hands so the camera could see.

“Ha,” Jeremy said without thinking. Michael turned to him, raising his eyebrow. “Jeremy _Heere_.”

Michael closed his eyes, snorting. “Oh my god. I can’t believe I didn’t see that.”

“I mean, I’ve had a lifetime of experience,” Jeremy said. Michael waggled his eyebrows.

“Oh, I bet you have.”

“What does that even mean?” Jeremy asked, cracking up. Michael joined him.

“I have no idea, oh my god.” They laughed for a minute before they remembered that they were filming a video. “Oh, shit! Right, guys, so this is the Boyfriend Tag!”

The actual filming became a sort of blur to Jeremy. Michael had the list of questions on his phone and read them off, and then they both answered. Some of Jeremy’s answers were embarrassing, like for question #3- “What was your first impression of me?”

“Like my actual first impression, or my first in-person impression?” Michael had to think about it.

“Let’s go with actual first impression.”

“Oh, no, that’s the embarrassing one!” Jeremy laughed a little, but said, “I mean, I remember that your video was in my recommendations- it was for your first Apocalypse of the Damned video. I just remember looking at the thumbnail and thinking- ‘there’s no way someone that cute likes the same nerdy shit as me’.”

“You’re lying! That was so not your first thought,” Michael said, disbelieving. 

“I swear, it was!”

They had a lot of fun with question #5- “Does he have any weird obsessions?”

“Pft, what kind of question is that?” Jeremy asked. “Obviously!”

“Uh, my obsessions are not _weird_ ,” Michael insisted. “Video games and vinyl are _popular_ nowadays, thank you very much.”

“Is it popular to have a collection of stuffed lions?” Jeremy asked innocently. Michael gasped, clutching his chest as if he was incredibly insulted. “Your thing for lions is cute, but yeah it’s kinda weird.”

“The Lion King is a great movie and you know it!” Jeremy raised his hands in mock defense.

“Hey, I’m not saying it isn’t. Still weird, though.”

And the video went on. Jeremy found himself having a lot more fun than he’d expected, but really was that such a surprise when he was with Michael?

By the end of it, the two of them were a giggling mess, both leaning into each other. Jeremy wiped tears from his eyes.

“Oh, that’s gonna be fun to edit,” Michael said with a sigh. He pushed his glasses up his nose and ran his fingers through his hair.

“Was that okay?” Jeremy asked. 

“That was great,” Michael said earnestly. “I think it’ll be a really good video.”

“I hope so.”

“It will be. You seemed like you were having fun.” Michael stood up and turned off the camera and the lights. Jeremy blinked a few times to adjust to the lower, more natural lighting.

“I mean, shit’s always fun when I’m with you,” Jeremy said honestly. “But I don’t think I wanna do something like that again.”

Michael was quiet a moment, but there was a fond smile on his face. Finally, he said, “Fair enough. Vlogs, though?”

Jeremy sighed and said, “Sure. I could do vlogs.”

“Eh, maybe not,” Michael said playfully. Jeremy cocked his head to the side and he continued, “Maybe I just wanna keep you all to myself, how about that?”

“That sounds good to me.”

Michael beamed. “Yeah?”

Jeremy stood up, ambling towards him. He kissed Michael on the cheek, and then on the lips. “Yep. I’m all yours.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it, folks! I just wanna thank all of you for reading this and leaving your super sweet comments!! It really means the world to me and never ceases to put a smile on my face. I really hope you enjoyed this story- and be on the lookout, because I'll probably be posting the first chapter of my next fic in the next week or so (it's gonna be a long one, so buckle up!!).
> 
> Also, once again, special thanks to Piper for being amazing and cheering me on with every freaking chapter. It's so nice to have a friend to talk to about my writing, so thank you so much!!


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